Kasumi and the Phantom Thieves
by Angel Ducktales 5
Summary: Kasumi has been through many things in her life...but nothing can match the amazing adventure of what she had been through recently, being part of the Phantom Thieves who change the hearts of corrupt adults and dish out justice! While working with the group, Kasumi learned many life lessons...
1. Chapter 1: Mask

Chapter 1: Mask

Kasumi has always been a good person. At least, she thinks so.

At the very least, she hasn't done anything morally wrong. She made a couple of mistakes, sure, but everyone does. She's human, after all, just like the rest of them.

The point is, she's leading a life like any normal good person would...but unfortunately, living that way also leads to a boring life, but hey, what can she do about that?

Still, Kasumi does feel that her life needs at least a little spicing up. So she took gymnastics as her personal hobby and for a while, it actually did a good job on giving her life a little more excitement.

It went on like that for the rest of her childhood. And throughout all these years, life was good.

That is, until the teen years rolled in and she decided to transfer to Shujin Academy.

She had heard many great things about this school. It does help that this school has such an amazing reputation, to the point that it gives off a preppy vibe. She doesn't mind that though, mostly because she wants to get into a good school to go further on her road to a good future.

And thus, she started her first week at Shujin in April. She was hoping to meet similar good people who shares her ideals and such...

Instead, she saw apathetic people who aren't willing to do anything to help others. The people who actually lets horrible stuff happen to others. The people who actually shuns that one person just for making one huge mistake in the past.

It was like that throughout the entire first week...and all the apathy from others end up making Kasumi become aloof.

That first week made Kasumi wear a mask... Sure, she wasn't involved in any bad situations and all...but she felt like if she ever tried to help and defend some innocent person, she might get into trouble. The whole place felt very oppressive. And thus, that's how Kasumi developed her aloof attitude.

She wondered if she has to wear the aloof mask for the rest of her time here, possibly for the rest of her life if this keeps up.

Well, it could have been like that...

_...until a certain day happened._


	2. Chapter 2: New Experiences

Chapter 2: New Experiences

The first week was quite a drag to Kasumi. She was hoping that next week would be different... Oh, who was she kidding? Next week is probably gonna be the same... The first week only proved that this kind of behavior is apparently the status quo.

So she's not trying to get her hopes up as she walked through Station Square, trying to find her way to the train that will take her to school as usual. That is, until she ran into someone.

"Whoa!" She exclaimed before quickly recovering and looking at who she bumped into. That person seems to be an old man. She quickly bowed down, knowing to respect elders, as she said, "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to bump into you!"

The old man also seems to be pretty jolly, because he responded, "Ah, no worries! It's no big deal!" Kasumi internally sighed in relief as she looked back at the old man. "Oh, thank..."

Before she could finish that sentence, the old man quickly grabbed her arm, rather forcefully. "...you?" She finished as her relief has quickly switched to confusion.

"In fact... I'm glad that you bumped into me!" He said with a bit of a sinister tone.

Kasumi's confusion has quickly switched to terror.

"Now, come with me!" He demanded as he tried to pull her from a safe, public place. The old man's horrible intentions is obviously a no-brainer...

Kasumi tried to wrestle her hand free. Unfortunately, the old man's grip is too strong, which is strange, considering his age, but she has no time to think about that right now.

She tried calling for help. "Someone, please help!" She yelled. Sure, she knew about the status quo, but deep down, she hopes that there's at least one good soul out there...

When it seems like no one came, she sighed. She should have known better than this. The status quo obviously won't change. She closed her eyes fearfully, inner strength waning, as she started to accept her fate...

...until a teenage boy walked over to them. He cleared his throat to get the old man's attention. "Excuse me, but you're harassing my sister. I suggest that you back off or else." He simply said to the old man.

Kasumi felt surprised. She didn't expect his intervention and she certainly didn't expect what he just said. There's no way that she could be related to this boy... What is he even doing?

Luckily, that seemed to scare the old man off as he let go of Kasumi's arm and he ran off, saying, "Oh, there's no way in hell I'm gonna mess with someone like that!"

After that, the boy turned over to Kasumi and quickly said, "Follow me."

At this point, she has no idea what is happening, so she decided to go with the flow by following him to the train station. Once they're there, safe from any more molesters, Kasumi decided to show how thankful she is for this deed and bowed down. "Thank you so much, umm..." She said before realizing that she didn't know his name.

The boy seems to know her brief plight though as he replied with, "Kurusu. Akira Kurusu." Kasumi briefly smiled as she again said, "Oh! Thank you so much, Kurusu-kun!" Yup, she's the type of person who sticks to the honorifics for kind strangers until she gets to know them better.

"Oh, no problem! It's nothing, actually." Akira replied while scratching his head. It seems he's awfully humble about his good nature...

Kasumi noticed one interesting detail about him though. He's wearing the same school uniform she's wearing... That means he goes to the same school she goes to! What a coincidence!

And of course, Akira happened to notice that detail too. "Well, I'll see you later." He said, knowing that he will see her later at school. Kasumi nodded happily as she said, "You too!"

Then she went over to the train she usually goes to and sat on the seat, waiting for it to arrive at school.

_That certain day certainly gave her a terrifying, but mostly great new experience that convinced her that she's not alone...and not only that, but she also made a new friend to boot!_


	3. Chapter 3: Suspicion

Chapter 3: Suspicion

Kasumi and Akira have been hanging out with each other at school ever since the day he saved her from the creepy old man. They just simply talked about their days and stuff like that, nothing really big. It went on like that for a couple of months. Throughout these months, Kasumi noticed how Akira has a strange habit to excuse himself from whatever they're doing, saying that he "has important matters to attend to", and then leave quickly. It's kinda strange, but Kasumi didn't mind, assuming this is his own strange quirk.

These events also coincided around the time when she first started hearing about those Phantom Thieves who steals and changes the hearts of corrupted adults. Again, she didn't pay much mind to it, dismissing these extraordinary tales as simple rumors.

Then June rolled around...

_That was the month where Akechi's popularity has skyrocketed._

Just one simple appearance on some talk show and Akechi was all anyone can talk about at the moment. Kasumi found that a little annoying, but she accepted that this is how the majority of society would act, always jumping into a bandwagon of the latest trends.

She did find one interesting detail about Akechi though: He spoke out against the Phantom Thieves' methods. He brought up a point about how their methods are not a good way to hand out justice. His Phantom Thieves discussions and theories are quite interesting indeed. Kasumi still didn't care much for the whole thing though.

Then one day, Akira went up to her and said, "Akechi wants us to meet with him at some café." Kasumi felt surprised as she replied, "Wait, how am I involved in this?" Akira scratched the back of his head as he answered, "He noticed how much we hung out with each other and therefore, he wants to speak to you too. Apparently, he thought that you are also interesting..."

"Oh..." That was all Kasumi could say before following Akira to that cafe.

Kasumi, Akira, and Akechi sat with each other on the table. Akechi and Akira were simply discussing about what Akira said back in the TV station trip and how it makes an interesting antithesis to Akechi's theory.

Honestly, Kasumi didn't pay any mind to this, having not paid any attention to the Phantom Thieves news. And it went on like that for almost the whole time...

...Until Akechi glanced at Kasumi and asked her a question. "So, what do you think of the Phantom Thieves' methods?" He questioned her. Kasumi sure didn't expect to be put on a spot like this. She gulped nervously, but she decided to tell her honest opinions.

"Well... The Phantom Thieves seem like a very dedicated group. I do find their methods impressive...but I also find them unnecessary." She stated. This prompted a surprised glance from Akira and Akechi. She continued, "Why go through all the trouble of stealing some corrupt adult's heart when you can just simply help someone in need? Sorry, but I honestly think the Phantom Thieves just want glory from those publicity stunts."

Akira simply stared at Kasumi, shocked speechless that she would really think of the Phantom Thieves that way. Akechi, however, smiled softly as he nodded. "You sure are quite an interesting individual, just like him." He said as he pointed at Akira. "I wonder what you would do if you are a Phantom Thief with those ideals... Yes, you are quite interesting, indeed..." And with that, he got up and left the café in a rather quick manner.

_Not only did this whole exchange baffled Kasumi, but it also aroused her suspicion of Akechi..._


	4. Chapter 4: Awakening

Chapter 4: Awakening

Ever since that suspicious meeting, Kasumi can't stop looking into the Phantom Thieves news. She wants to know more about them and their motives...

Researching the news about them was kind of a bust though, since it's full of nothing but speculations... It's basically something that you would find in a tabloid. This doesn't sit well with Kasumi...

Then she decided to see if there are any fan sites dedicated to them. Maybe they'll be a little more reliable since the fans pay a little more attention.

And to her surprise, there is one popular fan site—or rather, "Phansite"—that not only functions as a typical fan site, but there's also an active poll (that asks if the Phantom Thieves are just). And there's a section where people add requests for certain people that needs a change of heart, anonymously, of course.

That's when Kasumi got her eureka moment. Maybe she could add an anonymous request and lure the Phantom Thieves to her desired location so she can see how they operate! She giggled, never feeling more proud of herself in her entire life for coming up with such an ingenious idea.

She decided that luring them to the train station would be a good start. Now, what request can she come up with...?

She thought back to her encounter with that creepy old man... She shivered, but she started typing the request up. She had researched about the old man ever since the encounter (in hopes of finding dirt on him so she could get him arrested) and luckily, she had found his name. She typed down everything she knows:

"Hello there. I have an important request. There's someone at the train station who continuously stalks me. He's a creepy old man named Ora Bishi. He always threatens to do nasty stuff to me. Please, do something about this NOW."

She really wanted to get her point across in this request.

Anyways, it's all done and she smirked as she posted that request. There's no way the Phantom Thieves could ever ignore such a request like this...

A hour later, Kasumi is hiding near the train station, trying to look for any suspicious group. So far, no dice... You would think stakeouts would be more exciting, but you would be wrong.

A few minutes later though, and she gasped at an unexpected face: Akira.

This time, he's not alone. It seems that he's with a group of friends. There's a seemingly rowdy blonde boy, a platinum blonde girl whose looks are definitely suitable for a modeling job, a boy who gives off eccentric vibes, a brunette girl who looks like she has a high chance of going to a good college...and a black cat.

"What a strange group of friends..." Kasumi muttered to herself. Then she noticed that these guys are in the most secluded spot in Station Square. That made her a little suspicious of them. And then she saw Akira fiddling around with his phone and that's when she had enough as she started walking over to the group.

Before she could even ask a question though, a flash of purple entered Kasumi's vision, signaling that she's about to enter the world that she didn't even know exists. A little headache occurred shortly after as she fell to her knees and held her head, trying to endure the pain, as the world around her slowly changed...

Once the headache went away, Kasumi opened her eyes, only to see that she's not in Station Square anymore. Instead, she's now in a dark subway entrance, and it's not just a normal one either. This place gives off otherworldly vibes.

Not long after she discovered her current location, a voice rang out near her. "Hey, what the hell...?" In fact, the voice sounds like it's right next to her.

She turned around to see the most surprising sight of all: The Phantom Thieves!

She gasped as she stepped back, not sure how to feel about this.

"Oh... Seems like we messed up here. We should have been more observant next time. What should we do, leader?" An anthropomorphic cat asked.

Kasumi almost fainted upon this unusual sight of an anthropomorphic cat, but she wanted to stay conscious and see what happens next.

Then a teenage boy with a dark trench coat and white bird mask approached her. Kasumi observed that this person is a leader of this whole ragtag team. Not only that, but he also looks very similar to that other teenage boy in her life... Maybe they are even the same person!

The leader cleared his throat before looking back at the team and saying, "She should come with us. She would be very lost otherwise." The rest of the team gave off surprised looks, but they overall accepted the decision.

So now Kasumi is riding in the Morganamobile...which is actually the anthropomorphic cat's vehicle form.

...Yeah, at this point, she's gonna stop asking questions and go with the flow.

By now, everyone told her their code names (since they're currently in a Metaverse), making Kasumi feel a little bit more at ease.

"Ok, today's goal is to change Ora Bishi's heart. Everyone got that?" Queen questioned. "YEAH!" The rest of the team chorused.

...And that took some of Kasumi's ease away. She shivered, but Joker put a hand on her shoulder in a comforting way, apparently sensing distressing emotions. "It's going to be ok. We'll stick by your side, no matter what." He said.

That ended up putting a smile on her face. "Thank you." She said. "Don't mention it." He replied just as the Morganamobile entered a distorted room.

Everyone got out of the Morganamobile as soon as it stopped there and they looked around, spotting Shadow Bishi in the process. The demented person laughed as he said, "So you are here to change my heart, hm? Well, fat chance!"

Skull growled as he responded angrily, "What's that supposed to mean?! We'll take you down!" Shadow Bishi laughed once again, saying, "Well, whatever. I love doing what I do!" Then he took a sneaky glance at Kasumi, which she noticed. "...Especially when there's pretty girls involved." He added.

Nope, that did not sit well with Kasumi AT ALL. In fact, it pissed her off, for lack of a better term. "That's inexcusable! You shouldn't love doing what you do at all! It's disgusting!" She yelled. She couldn't take it anymore. She couldn't take the apathy of most people in this world anymore. She couldn't take the frequent injustice that happens everywhere she went anymore. And most importantly...

_She couldn't take hiding behind her aloof mask anymore._

That's when another flash of purple entered her vision, along with another headache. This time, there's a mental voice echoing in her head throughout her headache fit:

_It seems you finally found a way to help others without worrying about how others might think of your deeds... Let's make a contract to make this much more possible, shall we? I am thou, thou art I... Now is the time to teach a lesson on how to change the world...gracefully..._

After hearing such a speech, Kasumi started to feel her resolve coming back after such a while. Not only that, but a mask has also appeared on her face. She immediately tried to pull off her mask, but she discovered that it took a lot of effort to do so...and once she managed to do so, lots of pain ensued, to say the least.

Luckily, the pain quickly disappeared after this whole process. And what's the result?

Kasumi is now in her Phantom Thief clothes, along with her new Persona: Cendrillon. She also obtained a rapier and a rifle to use for battle...which is about to happen as Shadow Bishi transformed into Mara.

"This time, I won't let injustice happen anymore!" Kasumi said with full confidence as she and the rest of the Phantom Thieves prepared themselves for the battle.

_Yes, she has truly awakened her true self from the depths of her heart...and she's very glad that she did so._


	5. Chapter 5: Practice

Chapter 5: Practice

A battle is surely brewing as Kasumi and the Phantom Thieves got in position to deal some serious damage to Mara.

Kasumi went first, wanting to see how she could use her newfound skills. She decided to start with her rifle.

**BANG BANG BANG BANG!**

There goes her first round of bullets. It did no damage, making it null, which frustrated Kasumi.

Mara stumbled over to Kasumi and attacked her, which certainly made her lose her balance.

**CRITICAL!**

Mara jumped at an opportunity to attack Kasumi again, who is unfortunately unable to defend herself due to her stunned state.

Joker definitely isn't having this as he summoned Matador and used Garula on Mara, which whittled down some of its health.

Panther elected to just use her whip on such a creature, which did some damage.

Fox then summoned Goemon to use Bufula on Mara, which brought it down to half health.

After finally getting out of her stunned state, Kasumi decided to use what she just learned and she pulled out her mask (more easily this time). That summoned Cendrillon, and she noticed that her skills are mostly in a "Bless" category. She decided to use Kouha, which hurts Mara some more.

Then Mara decided to use Heat Wave...which tripped everyone up except Yusuke and Kasumi.

"Oh no! Seems like we're in trouble now... We have to do something about this!" Kasumi thought in her mind as Fox used Giant Slice on Mara, which surprisingly took away most of his health, leaving little left.

Kasumi spots an opportunity...and she jumps at it by using her rapier to damage Mara. "This is for going after me and all of those innocent people!" She yelled before finishing it off.

Joker and Panther got back up and by then, the whole team celebrated their victory. "We did it!" Panther exclaimed excitedly while Joker gave an approving nod to everyone.

Then Shadow Bishi appeared again. This time, he seems much more remorseful than before. "I really shouldn't done what I have did... I'm such a monster... Now I hate what I did..." You know, it's the typical ol' remorseful Shadow spiel.

And Joker is about to reply to those spiels like he always does, but Kasumi signaled him to stop before walking over to Shadow Bishi with the biggest glare ever.

"You know, if you knew what you were doing is wrong, then why did you do it? Did you seriously get joy out of hurting people?" She asked with a cold tone. The shadow can only stutter to such a response. "Because if so..."

**"...then you are NOTHING BUT A MONSTER!"**

The shadow whimpered loudly at the response...while everyone else is just flat-out surprised. "Whoa... She's so much more vicious than Queen! And that's saying something!" Skull commented before getting elbowed by Queen.

"F-Fine... I'll find some way to make up to you, guys..." Shadow Bishi said before disappearing, leaving some glowing sphere behind. Joker immediately went over and grabbed the glowing sphere, keeping it with him and obtaining a mini Treasure in the process.

Then he looked back at the group, making sure that everyone's eyes are on him...

"Let's get back to the real world." He ordered. Everyone else agreed as they got on the Morganamobile to drive back to the entrance.

Once they are out of the Metaverse, the whole team went over to the Accessway in the train station discuss a few things, right after introducing themselves with their real names, of course.

"Damn... After all of this, I'm sure that asshole learned his lesson." Ryuji commented. "Yeah! To be honest, Kasumi's speech kinda strengthened my heart!" Ann added. "Well, we sure work great as a team!" Makoto agreed. "Indeed, we are!" Yusuke said while Akira nodded in agreement with all of these statements.

Kasumi tried to take this all in. A Metaverse...mental distortions...and even becoming part of the Phantom Thieves?! The world has definitely turned upside-down for her.

"She's definitely a suitable Phantom Thief! She'll need a code name though. Hmm..." Morgana said as he tried to come up with something. Needless to say, it's not easy coming up with a code name for someone like Kasumi.

"Musketeer?"

"Madam?"

"Femme Fatale!"

So far, none of these names work for her...until she came up with an idea.

"How about Rogue?" She offered. "Hey, that's not a bad name at all!" Ryuji replied. Everyone else murmured in agreement. "It's settled! Welcome to the Phantom Thieves, Rogue!" Morgana stated as everyone else cheered, with Kasumi smiling all the while.

_After that little practice battle back there, Kasumi definitely earned her place in the Phantom Thieves..._


	6. Chapter 6: Preparation

Chapter 6: Preparation

The next day, Akira invited Kasumi to go shopping for equipment with him. Of course, she accepted the invitation, wondering what they're going to get.

Welp, she sure didn't expect to shop for model guns.

Kasumi looked over at Akira with puzzle as he picked out the latest model of the handgun. "So... Why are we shopping for this? I mean, I know we need guns for the Metaverse, but... Why model guns instead of the real deal?" She asked.

Akira glances over at her and he replied, "Oh, well, the enemies in the Metaverse would be convinced that it looks like a real gun and therefore, the model guns would function like real guns thanks to their cognition. Besides, we're not old enough to buy real guns." A sheepish grin appeared on his face.

"Ah..." Kasumi said as she went back to looking for the latest model of the rifle. Once she picked one, they went over to Iwai to purchase their choice of guns.

Iwai seemed pretty surprised when he saw Kasumi about to purchase her rifle. "Huh... I never thought you'll be the type to get into guns..." He commented. Kasumi raised her eyebrow at this, but other than that, they managed to purchase their guns without much trouble.

Next, they went over to a clinic of Akira's chioce. Of course, he chose to go over to Dr. Takemi's clinic.

Once there, Takemi noticed who he brought along with. "Oh, seems like your friend's with you, my little guinea pig." She said with a bit of a smirk. Kasumi raised her eyebrow again as she looked at Akira. He shrugged as he answered, "I have an interesting life."

Welp, that was a good enough answer for her.

After that, they walked into her office to purchase some drugs that can heal and revive them, as well as some drugs that can fix some ailments.

To be honest, this whole thing felt kinda shady to Kasumi, considering that they are buying unprescribed drugs, but Akira reassured that it's going to be okay. It seemed like he has tried those drugs before, and he seems okay, so she has reason to believe him. She smiled as she the went on to buy some helpful supplements for herself.

Finally, Akira offered Kasumi an opportunity to test her reflexes at the batting cage near them. The girl eagerly accepted the opportunity, thinking that it'll be fun. So she decided to go first when they got there.

Needless to say, it's a lot tougher than she thought. She got in position, readied her stance...and a ball zoomed past without her reacting AT ALL, leaving her shocked. It went on like that for the entire game.

"Geez... I didn't expect this game to really test my reflexes..." Kasumi bemoaned. "Don't worry, I'll help give you an example on how to do this." Akira replied as he stepped up for his turn. Kasumi can only nod in response as she watched him.

Akira got in position, readied his stance...and as soon as the ball shot out, he swung his bat and the ball got hit into the wall! It went on like that for the rest of the game, with Akira showing his impressive skill. He didn't hit any home runs, but he managed to hit every ball that came at him, which earned him a little prize.

"You see what I mean? Always hit whenever you have a gut feeling to do so." Akira stated. "Ah... I see! You know what, let me try again!" She said as she stepped up for her turn again. "Good luck!" He called out.

She got in the same position and readied her stance. Check. Now there's Akira's tip to consider...

The first two balls didn't go so well. The balls zoomed past without her reaction yet again. Then she realized that she should act early. Unfortunately, her definition of "early" meant that she swung the bat too early before the ball gets shot out. It was like that for the next ball too.

She's now down to her last ball. She tried to think of Akira's tip again...

_"Always hit whenever you have a gut feeling to do so."_

...and she took it to mean that she should listen to her heart. So she did exactly that. She waited for the perfect moment...

_**"NOW!"**_

She swung the bat immediately after her heart practically screamed. And she managed to hit the ball!

And not only that, but that hit also happen to be a home run hit!

She gasped in surprise while Akira clamped quickly and loudly, showing how impressed he is. "Nice one!" He complimented. Kasumi smiled as she replied, "Thank you!" She then quickly hugged him and after that, she went over to obtain her home run prize, which is an SP Adhesive. She felt that this will be useful for the Metaverse, so she pocketed that item.

_Needless to say, all the preparation made Kasumi feel at ease for whenever the time comes to steal someone's heart..._


	7. Chapter 7: Confidant

Chapter 7: Confidant

Kasumi has never felt so alive until yesterday, where she and Akira went shopping for guns and health supplements, and then after that, they played in the batting cage. That's exactly what her life has been missing: More new experiences!

So she decided that she should invite Akira and go somewhere to do something. She thought that the aquarium would be the best place to go. So when today rolled over, Kasumi and Akira went to the aquarium, hoping to see some amazing sights.

Once they got there, they looked for many varieties of fish. There are some fishes that just looks beautiful while there are some fishes that looks like they would be well-suited for any stealth mission (Or in their case, being Phantom Thieves!). There are even some fishes that gives off an illusion of them changing colors! Needless to say, Akira and Kasumi felt amazed throughout that whole trip.

Then they stopped near the angelfish tank. Kasumi looked at the group of fishes, clearly thinking about something. Akira glances at her, wondering what she could be thinking about.

After a little while, Kasumi began to speak. "You know, I think we're like a school of fish here." She began as she pointed at the group of angelfish in the nearby tank. "We are all pretty much just getting along with our lives, minding our own business and all that. We're not trying to do anything bad. We're just living our lives in the best way possible."

"Now, imagine if a shark dropped into this tank and went over to eat all of the fish here. The fish in the other tanks could do nothing about it but watch and maybe get eaten themselves if the shark managed to jump over to the other tanks. That's how it felt like for me. There are many bad people in this world that only wish to do harm...and most of us could do nothing about it but watch and hide behind our social masks, hoping not to get targeted ourselves. It makes me feel...helpless." Kasumi explained the whole metaphor and after that, she sighed. Something seems to be troubling her...

"I definitely know how you feel."

For a brief second, Kasumi forgot that Akira was there with her. Then she smiled after hearing what he said. "You do...?" She asked.

Akira nodded happily. "Long story short, I have been at the short end of the stick before when I got falsely accused for assault...but that's in the past now. Sure, my 'criminal record' may be following me, but that doesn't matter now. After all, we are the Phantom Thieves and together, we can reform this corrupt society." He said.

That little speech pretty much gave Kasumi lots of inspiration. She briefly giggled before hugging him. "I'm so glad that you're my friend, Kurusu-kun." She said happily. Akira hugged back before saying, "The feeling's mutual, my friend."

_Kasumi is beyond glad that she chose Akira as her confidant..._


	8. Chapter 8: Dance

Chapter 8: Dance

Welp, Kasumi didn't see any purpose for the school dance that happened out of nowhere.

In fact, she was fairly certain that the school dance was used to cover up controversial rumors surrounding this school. But whatever, that doesn't mean she couldn't have fun at this dance.

So she went over to the area near the stage where the singers are at. And surprisingly, she saw Akira near her spot. "Umm, hello there-" Kasumi was about to say...

_...until one of the country's most popular songs, "Take Over", played._

That's when she got the dancing bug. She struck out a few moves here and there, while the beat of the music just keeps on thumping and pleasing the crowd! Kasumi could definitely enjoy this!

...And then she glanced over at Akira and she stopped dancing while gasping in shock. Let's just say that Akira has a bright future as a dance choreographer! Because wow, those dance moves were something else! Then again, this is Akira after all, the guy that will never follow society's norms. He just likes doing his own thing.

Once he stopped dancing, he looked at Kasumi and smiled. "What do you think?" He asked in a kinda meek way. "Wow..." Kasumi can only say. The boy chuckled as he said, "They are that surprising, huh?" She can only nod at this. She definitely never saw it coming, huh?

_After that amusing little interlude, the pair continued to dance the day away until the teachers had to shoo the students away..._


	9. Chapter 9: Confidence

Chapter 9: Confidence

Rogue (known as Kasumi in the real world) and the Phantom Thieves are in the middle of a really tough battle in Mementos. They are going up against a Jack Frost who gets repeatedly buffed by two Pixies. That sounds like an easy fight, but again, the repeated buffing issue is the tough factor for this fight. It's certainly tough for Rogue.

She keeps on trying to fight back with her attacks, but she either misses or gets hit hard by a powered-up Jack Frost.

This inevitably leads to Rogue having low health after getting hit so much. But then again, Jack Frost has low health too, due to the team's efforts.

And it's Rogue's turn! It's all up to her now... Maybe a good ol' Kouha spell can finish it off! So she decided to use exactly that...and it missed! Jack Frost laughed and then it glared at her. This can't be good.

Then it charged right at her and attacked her! This took away enough Rogue's health to the point that she fell to the floor. She tried to get up, but she felt too weak to do so. She has a bad feeling that she just lost all of her health...

After witnessing such an unfortunate event, the rest of the team, with newfound determination, managed to finish off all the enemies. After all, with the Phantom Thieves, it's one for all and all for one.

Once the battle is over, Joker walked over to Rogue, wanting to see if she's alright. She managed to sit up at this point. "Are you alright?" He asked. Then, upon closer inspection, he noticed that she's crying. "Hm? What's wrong?" He asked again.

"I-I'm so sorry for being such a useless teammate... I should have tried harder..." She replied as she looked down at the floor sadly, letting her tears fall to the floor.

Joker then sat down next to her. "Hey, it's alright. You're not actually useless, you're just learning. And believe it or not, you actually learned the ropes pretty well. Especially with that impressive gymnastics skill of yours." He said, giving her a thumbs up.

Rogue looked over at Joker, with tears still in her eyes. "You really think so...?" She questioned. Joker happily nodded, confirming that what he just said is nothing but the truth.

Rogue then wiped the tears from her eyes and gave a small smile to Joker. "Thank you so much." She said in such a grateful tone. "No problem. Now, you want some of Takemi's healing drugs?" Joker asked. Now it's Rogue's turn to nod as Joker went over to her to heal her injuries with the healing drug.

_With friends like these, Rogue can definitely feel her confidence rising..._


	10. Chapter 10: Palace

Chapter 10: Palace

_Today is finally the day for the Phantom Thieves to storm Kaneshiro's palace and secure the route._

Rogue got the gist of the situation: The Phantom Thieves (sans Rogue, since she wasn't there when it happened) are in huge debt thanks to a certain incident... Incidentally, that incident also led to Queen joining the team. Still, they'll need to focus on changing Kaneshiro's heart so the debt can be called off and justice would be brought to him...served cold, since he has done horrible things.

"Ok, here's the plan." Joker began as the group stood in front of the entrance. "We'll just simply storm into his palace, keeping our eyes on the prize, and not get sidetracked. We want that debt off of us as soon as possible, right?" The group end up agreeing to this, not wanting to see what happens if they got to the deadline too late.

"Good. I'm glad that we all agree. Now, let's go!" Joker said and thus, the team ran inside the secret entrance, ready for whatever comes their way.

After making their way through some part of the palace, they made it to the monitoring room. There, they are able to see many security camera footages. There's a guard patrolling, trying too hard to act tough...and there's two guards who are basically doing the boredom dance.

"Ha, this is too damn easy!" Skull boasted as he looked around the room. Then he spotted the keys...

**SNATCH!**

"Man, I'm so glad to act like a real Phantom Thief, stealing stuff and shit!" He said, snickering all the while. "You can say that again!" Mona responded, which of course, garnered him the response of, "Man, I'm so glad to act like a real Phantom Thief, stealing stuff and shit-"

**"NOT LITERALLY, YOU IDIOT!"**

"...times two." Skull finished with a smirk, only making Mona more agitated. Rogue is just standing there with Joker. An incredulous look formed on her face. "Is this what the team is usually like?" Rogue questioned. "Yup, but we all love each other anyway." Joker replied. "Well, ok then." That was the only thing Rogue could say to that.

"Enough of this tomfoolery! We should focus on the task at hand." Fox tried to regain the focus for the team. "I think I may have a perfect idea..." Queen said as she looked at the security camera footage of the two guards...

"I got called up to the monitoring room! Lord Kaneshiro's will be angry if I don't follow orders!" One guard said to no one in particular. Seems that he wants to be the exposition guy someday... Little does he know that today would be the guard's last day.

He burst into the room...and saw nothing. "...Am I secretly blind or something?" The guard asked himself...and that's when he got jumped by the Phantom Thieves. "GRAHHHHH!" Thengyard screamed before turning into a Shadow. Yes, this will indeed be his last surprise...

"Geez, that guard was too mouthy. He should learn to shut up." Rogue commented once they defeated the guard. "Eh, you'll get used to it." Joker responded as he collected the battle money and the vault door keys. "I seriously still can't believe that THIS is your secret side job." Rogue replied with a look of disbelief as the team walked to the vault door so they can unlock it and go to the next area.

Joker had a bit of a devilish grin on his face, surprising Rogue, who has never seen Joker's typical behavior before. "It's fun. Need I say more?" Then he and his teammates opened the vault door with the keys, allowing access to the next room.

Welp, Rogue guessed that was a good enough explanation.

Throughout the next trek, things have been pretty good...until they got to the underground vault room. Complicated puzzles soon followed.

"Dammit! What is up with the corrupted adults' need to think up complicated shit?!" Skull cursed as he punched many codes in the machine, but nothing's working. He settled for punching the machine before giving up.

"Don't fret! From our experiences, us Phantom Thieves can always find a clue, no matter how hard the puzzle is!" Mona explained. That got Fox thinking. "Hmm... You think the notebook that Shadow Kaneshiro left behind could be any useful?" He suggested. "Let me take a look!" Panther offered as she inspected the notebook. "Hmm... There's some numbers...that equals into letters! That seems like a clue! ...Although, I'm not a big fan of mathematical clues..." She finished before frowning.

Queen was next to inspect the notebook. "I see... Guys, we have to punch in some numbers to make up a word!" She speculated and she looked at some letters on the machine. They spell the word 'rich.'

Rogue has heard all of this...and that's when something clicked in her! She walked over to the machine...and punched some numbers in. And before you know it, one of the doors opened!

"Whoa... So that's how it works... Nice job, everyone." Mona said, leaving everyone happy with this achievement. Time to push onward!

All of these code puzzles make up such an arduous journey...but it was all worth it as they opened up the last door and they made it to the treasure room.

Once they got there, Rogue only saw a cloud-like substance in there. "Huh...? Is that really a treasure?" She questioned in a bit of an incredulous tone, not believing what she's seeing.

"Yes, but it has not fully materialized yet. That's because Kaneshiro isn't aware that we're going to steal his heart...yet." Mona answered. Rogue looked curiously at the anthropomorphic cat. Mona continued, "Now that we have secured the route to the treasure, the next step would be to send a calling card."

Rogue didn't know exactly why, but she felt kinda excited about that. Maybe it's the thrill of this mission... "Ok... When can we do that?" Rogue asked. "Whenever Joker decides to." Mona answered again and Joker added, "We can send the calling card tomorrow."

It was a rather abrupt decision, but the team didn't care. They exploded with cheer, anxious to change this guy's heart already. And thus, they began to leave this place, ready for the next step.

_Now Rogue knows exactly what it's like to explore a palace with the Phantom Thieves..._


	11. Chapter 11: Greed

Chapter 11: Greed

The calling card has been sent yesterday...and now they get the chance to steal Kaneshiro's heart! No time like the present!

Rogue is especially excited about this since this is her first mission. Now it's time to prove her worth as a Phantom Thief!

So the team skipped over to the latest safe room (thank the heavens that the Phantom Thieves are such avid safe room explorers) and they immediately went over to the treasure room, where the real treasure should await.

But once again, when they got there, there's absolutely nothing. And this time, there IS absolutely nothing...not even that cloudy substance from before.

Instead, they found...a huge vault that took the cloudy substance's place.

_...and Shadow Kaneshiro._

The bastard wastes no time as he taunts them, "So you're here to take my precious belongings, huh? No wonder you guys are the scum of society."

After such a taunt, only Joker remained cool-headed while everyone else...gave Shadow Kaneshiro a piece of their mind. Including Rogue, and she barely knows the guy!

"Are you sure you're not talking about yourself?" She retorted to the horrible purple man. He only sneered in response as he said, "Looks like I'll have to teach you all a lesson on how to respect the people with higher power than you..."

And then, all of a sudden, he starts convulsing, freaking out everyone else. After a few seconds of uncomfortable convulsing, he seems to have turned into...a fly man. Can the Metaverse get any weirder?

"Yo, yo! I'ma gonna kick of y'all asses!" He shouted. Oh gosh, apparently, the transformation made him speak in jive turkey too.

"Not if we do it to you first, asshole!" Skull retorted and thus, the battle has begun.

To be honest, there wasn't much of a fight here at first. The Phantom Thieves simply attacked Shadow Kaneshiro and he retaliated with his attack. It's practically a back-and-forth battle.

That is, until Shadow Kaneshiro got damaged enough.

After taking enough hits, Shadow Kaneshiro grew frustrated. He's about had it with his enemies. "That's it! I'm calling in the heavy artillery!" He declared.

Right as he said that, the vault door slowly opened... The ominous and slow way it opened doesn't seem like a good sign...

The Phantom Thieves' worries are confirmed when the vault door fully opened...to reveal a huge robotic piggy bank.

Shadow Kaneshiro flew up to the top of the huge mech and he started taunting them again. "How do ya like me now, you pieces of shit?!" He shouted like a maniac.

_The real battle has finally started._

"We can't stop now. Let's give it all we got!" Joker commanded as a team of Skull, Mona, Rogue, and himself assembled.

Skull went first. "Get wrecked!" He yelled out as he called upon the power of Megaton Raid. That attack has damaged Kaneshiro pretty good.

Mona was up next. "Magarula!" He yelled out. His Persona, Zorro, granted that wish by shooting the namesake spell at Kaneshiro and the Piggytron.

Rogue and Joker both simply attacked the Piggytron, feeling confident enough to not want to use their Personas yet.

After their turn, Shadow Kaneshiro decided to spew fear gas at them. This only affected two people: Rogue...and Joker! Oh no, if the team leader gets affected by something like that, that means chaos can only follow soon after that...

Skull immediately noticed this predicament and he took out some kind of drug that will cure fear...and he gave it to Rogue instead of Joker.

"Ryuji! Why didn't you give Joker that medicine? We need his wild card powers for such a huge battle!" Mona explained. "Whoops..." Skull replied sheepishly while scratching his head. Mona sighed as he tried to look for more of the same medicine in their inventory...only to discover that Skull just used the last of that medicine. "You gotta be kidding me..." He muttered to himself before opting to just use Magarula on Kaneshiro and Piggytron again.

Thanks to that medicine, Rogue snapped out of it and boy, she sure wasn't amused. "Now you're going to get served some justice that you rightfully deserve!" She yelled as she casted Kouga on the Piggytron, which is starting to damage it a bit more.

Unfortunately, Joker is in a fearful state, preventing him from attacking. Instead, all he could do is mumble out of paranoia.

And that's when Piggytron transformed into its ball form, shocking the Phantom Thieves some more. Kaneshiro rolled on top of it, giving off an evil scowl. "I ain't waiting for any of you bitches to attack now!" He boasted.

He sure wasn't kidding as he rolled the huge ball over to the group so fast that they didn't have enough time to react. Needless to say, they incurred lots of damage from this attack and now fatigue is starting to take its toll on them.

"D-Dammit... I'm not going down yet..." Skull weakly said as he casted Zionga on the Piggytron. It's a good thing that they still have lots of energy to cast magical spells, huh? And even more so, this attack gave more than several dents on the Piggytron.

"R-Right..." Mona groaned before casting Magarula yet again. Apparently, that's Mona's favorite attack. It did damage the Piggytron enough that the wires of this machine are exposed now.

Rogue tiredly glances over at Joker, who's still dealing with his ailment. "J-Joker... Please remember the most important goal... Please remember the reason we even came here... Please keep the goal in mind so you can strengthen your resolve..." After her speech, she focused her attention on the Piggytron and casted Kouga again right before falling down out of exhaustion. Fortunately, that attack broke Piggytron more, leaving lots of exposed wires while leaving it look a little cracked. It seems it would need one more attack to get finished off. It's all up to Joker now!

Joker is currently fighting the mental battle of guts at the moment...but he is starting to take Rogue's speech to heart. Therefore, he used it to fight off all the fearful feelings...

"P-P..."

_**"...PERSONA!"**_

He was able to summon Matador and with the quick flick of his wrist, he casted Garula on the Piggytron, which was enough to take Piggytron down.

It ended up falling down and exploding, sending Shadow Kaneshiro and piles of gold bars into the air before falling back down to the ground!

The Phantom Thieves regained enough strength to get up and witness Kaneshiro crawling over to a pile of gold and whimper. It seems that he's that obsessed with money...

_Rogue has always wondered about greed and gluttony, and after seeing those things in action, she now fully understood..._


	12. Chapter 12: Calm after the Storm

Chapter 12: Calm after the Storm

The last few minutes of Kasumi's first mission felt like such a blur to her. She can vaguely remember participating in the Phantom Thieves' short speech to Kaneshiro on what he did was wrong, gathering some piles of gold to put in the Morganamobile, and riding from the Palace-collapsing chaos. It was...quite thrilling, to be honest.

But now she feels kinda anxious about whether or not Kaneshiro's heart will change thanks to said mission. It's now July 9, the day of the deadline and she asked Akira (via text) to come with her to the diner. He accepted, of course, probably hoping to increase his bond with her more. Kasumi doesn't blame him, since she does like hanging out with her trusted friend.

Once they met up at the diner and took their seats, Kasumi immediately cuts to the chase.

"Hey, so... How does a change of heart work? I have been feeling anxious for days ever since I thought of this question..." Kasumi said with a small frown.

Akira stroked his chin in thought, which seems to be his signature pose whenever he thinks about literally ANYTHING. Then he answered, "Well, we just usually wait for the change of heart to take place. My friends have gotten anxious over this before, just like you, because they too don't know if they had succeeded in changing a heart. But I always reassure them that their efforts are not in vain. The first two missions wasn't a failure, so why would the third one be? After all, the third time's a charm, right?"

Kasumi giggled in a response to that last sentence. "Wouldn't that be more appropriate to say it if your first two missions have failed?" She playfully questioned.

Akira nodded in agreement. "Yeah, you're right. Still, the third charm should still be a charm, because you know, it's lucky or something like that." He said with a shrug and a smile.

"Hehe, I suppose you're right." Kasumi said before glancing at the nearby diner TV, which screamed, "BREAKING NEWS!"

That reminded Akira of something. "Oh yeah, I am starting to notice a pattern though. Every time we're on the day of the deadline, that's when we learn that some major criminal's heart has been changed." He explained.

Kasumi felt surprised to learn about this interesting piece of info and then she glanced at the TV again.

_"Junya Kaneshiro has been arrested after he confessed about his evil deeds..."_

Akira smirked. "Called it." He said.

_After hearing about all of this, that's when Kasumi finally felt some calm after the storm..._


	13. Chapter 13: Celebration

Chapter 13: Celebration

"Aw, hell yeah!"

"Looks like we have succeeded after all."

"Now let's celebrate!"

The whole gang is at the Ogikubo ramen restaurant, celebrating the latest mission's success. And boy, are they enjoying this a lot! Here are some highlights:

Ryuji noisily slurped all the ramen he could eat. The dude's quite a ramen enthusiast, that's for sure. Everyone else sure got the message too. They just wish that he can stop slurping so loudly, especially for Ann.

"Ryuji, can you stop eating it like that? It's kinda messy." Ann requested, which pretty much got ignored by Ryuji. She internally sighed, preparing for what felt like the longest meal ever as she dramatically ate those noodles, sighing after each bite.

Yusuke doesn't seem too bothered by this, as he is more focused on the art of...plain ramen. "Such taste... Such style!" He said in pretty much the most dramatic way you can think of. Then again, you can't blame the starving artist since he's perpetually kind of broke most of the time, preventing him from enjoying food often.

And Makoto knows that pretty well, as she said, "Well, you can go on and enjoy the complexities of ramen all you want. I'll just eat carefully, just to make sure that I don't get food poisoning or anything like that." And thus, she began to eat real slowly. Ironically, that makes her the most normal customer out of these guys.

Akira and Kasumi watched the whole thing with amused grins on their faces. "Is this how most mission celebrations are like?" She asked. Akira nodded as he replied, "Yup! You can say that these are even our celebrations in the nutshell!"

And then he added some sweet peanuts into his ramen, trying to enhance the taste, which Kasumi definitely noticed.

"...How long were you waiting to make this pun?" She questioned incredulously. "Oh, for about a few months now." He replied bluntly.

_Well, after such a celebration, Kasumi can definitely get used to this double life that they all share..._


	14. Chapter 14: Mystery

Chapter 14: Mystery

Ever since Kasumi's first mission, she quickly got into the swing of things as a Phantom Thief. She immediately got used to her double life. In fact, she loved it.

Take her recent summer, for instance. It's entirely composed of Kasumi and the team helping a frenzied girl named Futaba, who had such a horrible past of losing her mom that she hates herself for this whole incident. Not only that, but she has so much self-hatred that she ended up developing her own palace.

Naturally, the Phantom Thieves jumped to help her out by doing their usual (well, not exactly usual in her case) methods of stealing her heart. After eventually succeeding and helping her regain happiness in herself again, she proved her worth by taking down Medjed (who has been threatening the Phantom Thieves multiple times) and their website. That pretty much earned Futaba a place in the Phantom Thieves, as well as gaining a new friend in her.

_Needless to say, that was the best summer Kasumi ever had._

Of course, they had to go back to school once summer ended. But guess what?

_**They are going on a school trip to Hawaii in a few days! What luck!**_

And that's exactly where Kasumi is at right now. To be honest, the trip wasn't that exciting so far since they ended up doing the same ol' stuff that they did back in Tokyo.

So on the third day, Kasumi wanted to at least spice the trip up a little...with a prank.

Kasumi entered the gift shop, wondering what prank to do. Hopefully, she'll find some sort of novelty prank toy...

Instead, she spotted Akira, who is standing in one spot and he's pretty preoccupied with his phone at the moment.

It's perfectly set up for Kasumi to mess with Akira.

She snuck up behind him, knowing exactly what to do. She inhaled and...

"Koni...chi..."

**"...WAH!"**

She immediately giggled due to the sheer ridiculousness of what she just did. Akira simply glanced at Kasumi with one eyebrow raised. "Uhhh... What's up?" He said with a bit of an unsure tone.

She stopped giggling to notice that Akira didn't even seem fazed by her scare. "How did you not get scared?" She asked with wonder.

"Oh, well, I'm pretty much focused on important stuff." He replied as he looked at his phone. "Important stuff?" She repeated, hoping to get an answer out of this.

Upon being asked this, Akira showed Kasumi his phone.

She sees the Phansite. The website is nothing new, since it has been around for more than a few moths at this point...but there's a new feature being shown here. This feature is the target rankings.

Basically, people can now rank whoever deserves to get their heart changed the most. Whoever is consistently #1 in those rankings would be the next target for the Phantom Thieves to go after.

And the consistent winner of the rankings is...Mr. Okumura.

"We need to have a team meeting about this." Akira whispered to Kasumi, who nodded in agreement.

The gang (sans Futaba and Morgana, since they can't go on the trip for their own reasons) met up in a somewhat secluded area near Big Bang Burger. The team meeting can now commence.

"Ok, so Okumura could be the next target for us to go after?" Ann wondered. "It would appear so... I had heard lots of shady rumors involving him and his company, especially as of late." Yusuke said while stroking his chin in thought.

"Hmm... He might be the reason why people are suffering from mental shutdowns and psychotic breakdowns. He has quite some power in order to do so." Makoto theorized. "Well, that's all the more reason to go after an asshole like him, right?" Ryuji replied.

Kasumi scratched her hair. Something doesn't add up... "Are you sure some fast food company owner can cause this much damage?" She questioned. "Well, I heard that he's trying to get into the political world now...and now that I think about it, he might be doing some shady stuff in order to get there." Makoto theorized some more. No wonder she wanted to be a police commissioner in the future.

"That's quite concerning..." Yusuke sighed. "Yeah, I agree..." Ann added. Kasumi looked over at Akira. "Well, what do you think? Do you think we should go after Okumura next?" She asked.

Akira looked at all of of his teammates slowly...and then he he pushed up his glasses and said, "Yes. He would be the next suitable target for us."

"Hell yeah!" Ryuji cheered. "Well, that settles it. Let's do this once we get home!" Ann said. "YEAH!" Everyone else (except Akira, the quiet one) cheered.

_Little did they know that a certain fluffy-haired girl is watching them, witnessing the whole mystery unfold..._


	15. Chapter 15: Uncertainty

Chapter 15: Uncertainty

After the Hawaii trip, the team immediately got to work on the Okumura case. They researched him, went to his Palace, and did their standard procedures to steal the heart.

To be honest, Kasumi thought that this Palace might be the easiest one she had ever done. Sure, she had to deal with that pesky air vent maze, but other than that, she thinks it's so easy. The point is that Kasumi is now completely used to the Phantom Thief life and she thought absolutely nothing bad will happen during this mission.

So they went and stole his heart, gaining a new teammate in Haru (who was that same fluffy-haired girl who eavesdropped on the team during the Hawaii trip) and defeating Shadow Okumura in the process.

Kasumi is super confident that nothing can go absolutely wrong! And when she received news from her teammates that they're going to spend a night at Destinyland (thanks to Haru being able to basically rent the whole park for the night due to being rich)—which is the same night as the deadline, no less—she cheered! This is the best mission she has ever gone on!

So when the team meets up at Destinyland on the night of the deadline, they are buzzing.

"I can't believe we changed his heart like it was nothing! It's freakin' awesome!" Ryuji said. "I know, right? I'm so glad that we are giving people some courage in their hearts!" Ann agreed. "I must say, the art of phantom thievery is one of the most beautiful arts I have ever seen." Yusuke stated. "Well, I think seeing some poetic justice has got to be very gratifying for me." Makoto replied. "Watching you guys in action is like watching the most exciting walkthrough ever!" Futaba said with a smile. "Hehe, I see everyone is very excited... I'm very glad to see that." Haru gracefully said.

Akira and Kasumi glanced at each other, being the usual witnesses for the team's celebrations. This may be the biggest celebration yet...

Then everyone noticed their phones buzzing with a notification.

"The live press conference is about to start!" Kasumi stated. Hearing this, everyone frantically scrambled to get their phones and they looked at their screens with anticipation.

Okumura is sitting there with a remorseful look on his face. That's already a good sign that their mission is a success. Then he said, "I have done things that are...unbecoming of a corporate boss... I have treated my workers badly... I haven't even gave them lunch breaks... And I would like to especially apologize for disregarding my daughter's feelings about her arranged marriage... I would like to call it off now..."

The tears have started to well up in Haru's eyes. The team knew that Haru is the daughter of Okumura, so they're happy to see that they fixed Haru's situation as well. "Father..." She said before trailing off.

Okumura was about to continue...before he suddenly choked and gasped for air. He felt the life sucking from him quickly and in that very moment, his life flashed before his eyes. That's when he thought...

_"I'm very sorry, Haru..."_

As soon as he processed the thought, his head fell down into the table. It seems that he's dead now... Something went wrong here...

The Phantom Thieves couldn't believe what they just saw. It took a full minute for then to process what they just saw. It definitely scarred them, that's for sure...

It surely affected Haru the most though, for obvious reasons. She tried to say something, but wasn't able to due to the overwhelming sadness. Then she end up running off while sobbing. "Haru!" Makoto said, but the gang wasn't able to stop Haru. She definitely suffered the most...

"I can't believe you, guys..."

They looked over to see who said that. And to their shock, it was Kasumi.

"I can't believe you guys messed up and killed someone's father!" There's definitely a tone of anger in her voice.

"Whoa, hold up! We're as confused as you are, but I'm pretty damn sure we didn't mean to do that!" Ryuji retorted. "Yes... Please hear us out." Makoto pleaded.

Kasumi sighed as she started to walk off. She doesn't know what to do anymore.

"Kasumi." She turned to see who said that and discovered that it was Akira who said that. "Phantom Thieves exist for the purpose of helping the weak, not killing others and causing destruction." He stated.

Kasumi stared at him and others for a full minute. Then she turned around and walked off, shaking her head. "I'm sorry, it's just that... I don't believe it anymore..." And with that, the conversation was over as she walked out of Destinyland.

_Uncertainty is definitely going to plague her future now..._


	16. Chapter 16: Random Encounter

Chapter 16: Random Encounter

Kasumi has never felt so lost in her entire life. Ever since she puts her aloof mask back on, a few days of hopelessness went by. She thought the Phantom Thieves helped people, but she learned the seemingly horrible truth of them actually killing people. And she felt more horror over the fact that she was one of the Phantom Thieves.

The horror never stops there as she realized that the previous criminal that got a forceful change of heart might have died too and they just had never heard from them.

Kasumi sighed as she sat down on the park bench. Today was yet another day of her thinking deep and horrifying realizations...or it would have been like that, had Akechi not approached her.

The teen detective sat down next to Kasumi and he looked over at her. "Something seems to be troubling you... Care to tell me what's wrong?" He asked.

She sighed as she replied, "Well, I just learned that the Phantom Thieves are cold-blooded killers now..." As she said that, something didn't feel right in her heart...

"Oh, is that so? Well, I'm so sorry to hear that... You must have been mulling over this a lot." He mused. Then he dropped this: "Especially since you were a former Phantom Thief."

That shocked Kasumi, making her look at him with wide eyes. "H-How did you know that?" She questioned. "You can never hide things from the ace detective, that's all." He answered with a chuckle. Kasumi didn't think that was a great explanation, but she'll let that go for now. "Well, I think people should help themselves without the Phantom Thieves, regardless of whether they are killers or not." She stated her beliefs.

"Ah, yes. I do remember you saying something similar like this before." Akechi observed. Kasumi simply nodded, ready to end this conversation at this point...

_...but Akechi wasn't done yet._

"I do have a plan though. This plan might help us outwit the Phantom Thieves and it might help the police take them down once and for all. If this plan succeeds, we can finally give justice a good name again. What do you say?" He offered.

That was quite an interesting offer, Kasumi had to admit. And finally bringing some genuine justice back sounds pretty good to her.

"Sounds like the best idea ever. I accept." And with that, they shook hands to signify this deal.

_The entire incident and the random encounter has aided in distorting Kasumi's heart more and more..._


	17. Chapter 17: Suspense

Chapter 17: Suspense

"Remember the plan? When I give you a signal, that's the time for all of us to go to the back room, ok?"

"Ok, I get it!"

Today's the day of Akechi's guest appearance in the school festival. And today would also be the day where the little plan between Akechi and Kasumi finally gets initiated.

"Alright, here we go." And with that, he entered the school building with Kasumi following shortly. They separated once they're inside.

Truth be told, the school festival looks kinda fun. There's all sorts of games, foods, and whatnot...but there's no time for that now.

Shortly after that, she spotted a bit too familiar group... The Phantom Thieves. Welp, it's now or never.

She walked over to them and as soon as they spotted her, they immediately rushed over to her...and they hugged her!

Kasumi didn't expect this reaction at all. She thought they would abandon her after she walked off from them on that certain day... Maybe, just maybe...

"Kasumi, we were so worried about you!" Ann exclaimed. "We thought you would be gone forever..." Futaba added in a bit of a sad tone. "But we're so glad that you're ok!" Makoto said. "And not only that, but I think we have some good clues on who is the true killer here...but I think it's best to discuss about this another time." Haru replied.

"Uhh... Yeah, what they said." Ryuji said while Yusuke simply nodded. Then Akira walked to the front of the group and to Kasumi. "Welcome back, Kasumi." He said with a small smile.

This whole interaction warmed Kasumi's heart quite a lot... It actually almost made her regret what she was going to say next. "Hey, guys... I'm sorry to trouble you with this, but I'm getting blackmailed by a boy in this school... If I told you guys who he is, he will leak incriminating stuff about me..." She explained, almost to the point of tears.

"WHAT?! Alright, this bastard is gonna get it now!" Ann screamed. She really hated stuff like this, as Kasumi could tell. The rest of the team angrily nodded.

"There is a way though... He wants to meet the Phantom Thieves in the back room. He simply wants to fulfill the dream of finally meeting the Phantom Thieves in person. After that, he would probably destroy incriminating stuff about me." Kasumi explained.

"Ok then...? Well, whatever it takes to help you out in this situation!" Ann said. "Yeah... Let's just focus on what Akechi's gonna say for now. After thid, we'll go to the back room, okay?" Kasumi suggested. "Sounds like a plan!" Futaba said while everyone else agreed. Then they walked inside the auditorium.

Akechi's guest appearance went pretty smoothly...until he had to take a phone call. He called a ten minute break as he left the auditorium.

"Now's our chance! Let's quickly get to the back room and get my situation over with!" Kasumi shouted as she swiftly ran out of the auditorium, with others following.

Once they got there though... All of them didn't expect a situation that would unfold right about now.

"Hello everyone." Akechi greeted. "What the? What are you doing here?" Futaba questioned. "Huh? I thought that the creepy boy is here...?" Kasumi said, playing up her act.

"It appears that he left. I'll get him next time." Akechi stated, fooling the Phantom Thieves before looking at the group. "Anyways... I want to show you something."

Right as he said that, he placed the photos on the table. It's not just any photos though. These photos show literally all the Phantom Thieves seemingly appearing out of nowhere and running from Okumura Foods Headquarters. In other words, it places all of them in a highly suspicious light and it'll be real bad if these photos got shown to the public.

Kasumi gasped, not expecting such a tactic from him at all. "I have video evidence too." He added, making this situation seem more worse. "But I'm pretty generous, so I'll make a deal with all of you. If you accept my deal and fulfill it, then I won't show these photos to the public. But if you don't, then I'll show them to the police and get you all arrested. Is that clear?"

The gang looked at each other. They are pretty frustrated for getting themselves tricked into this situation, but at least it's not quite a critical mistake. Looks like they have no choice though...

"We accept your deal." Akira said. Akechi smiled. "Good. We'll discuss more details about this at Leblanc tomorrow." He stated before taking the incriminating evidence and leaving.

The team groaned as they walked out of the room. "Dammit, I can't believe this happened to us!" Ryuji complained. "Yes... What do we do now...?" Haru asked. No one responded as they walked out of the school.

_This all added up to a pretty suspenseful day for all of them and Kasumi cannot believe that she was one of the leading causes of said suspense..._


	18. Chapter 18: Next Target

Chapter 18: Next Target

Welp, today's the day. Akechi will tell the Phantom Thieves details about this whole deal today at Leblanc. And honestly, Kasumi feels dread about this whole thing.

She's currently in an inner conflict with herself. She wasn't even sure if the plan's true purpose was for justice or not. Her head continually hurts after thinking about these questions so much...

Whatever. Kasumi is currently on her way to Leblanc, knowing where to go after having been there many times before. This simple walk to a humble café should be no problem, right?

Well, that's what she would have thought...

_...if she hadn't suddenly been assaulted by some creepy man._

This already gave her flashbacks to the day she was assaulted by Ora Bishi. She did remember Akira appearing to save the day...but here? Now she feels that there's no chance, since she had almost abandoned her friends before. After all, why would they want to save someone who basically betrayed them?

Before she could get dragged to the alleyway though, she heard a voice.

_**"Stop. This. Right. Now."**_

She turned to look and she spotted Akira standing near the alleyway with a huge glare. And not only that, but he wasn't alone either.

"I'm so sick of those damn perverts... You better step the hell away or else!" Ryuji shouted, providing some pretty useful backup for Akira.

The attacker had enough common sense (though not enough to prevent this whole situation from happening in the first place) to run away from something like this.

Once that's over with, they looked at Kasumi. "Are you ok?" The boys both said at the same time. Kasumi felt pretty shaken up, but otherwise, she's doing pretty good. "Y-Yeah." She answered. And with that, they walked to Leblanc. This whole incident has aided Kasumi on clearing up some distortions in her heart and gradually start warming up to the Phantom Thieves again...

Once everyone gathered at Leblanc, Akechi cleared his throat as he spoke in front of the whole group. It's finally time...

"So, here's the deal. Ever since that certain incident, the police are actively going after the Phantom Thieves now, to the point of even sending the Special Investigations Unit to do so!" Akechi explained.

"What?! That's like the toughest level of policemen ever!" Futaba exclaimed anxiously. Akechi nodded grimly. "Indeed. Furthermore, Sae Niijima is going to lead this investigation. Knowing her, she has been thirsting for winning so much that she would probably make up a fake discriminating evidence just to get the Phantom Thieves in trouble and win the case."

"Well, that's preposterous! They wouldn't do that, would they?" Yusuke questioned. "Unfortunately, they would. The police are corrupt that way. Fortunately, I have a solution! As you may know, something happened to make Sae be in that corrupted state. In other words...

_"...Sae developed her own Palace."_

Akechi's revelation shocked everyone, especially Makoto, who happens to be a younger sister of Sae. Although, she has been theorizing about this for a while now...and unfortunately for her, she turned out to be correct.

"So you're saying that we should change her heart and get rid of those corrupted desires?" Ann asked. "Precisely. That way, Sae won't go after us when the day of the investigation comes on November 20th. That would be our deadline, by the way." Akechi answered.

"Ah, I see..." Haru said before everyone remembered Sae's family relation and looked at Makoto. "Makoto... Do you think you'll be fine about this whole plan?" Kasumi asked out of concern.

"Well... It's going to be hard... I was hoping that this wouldn't be true...but it seems to be true anyways. So I'm just going to focus on helping my sister, whatever it takes." Makoto replied with determination evident in her voice.

"Hell yeah! Let's do this for Makoto!" Ryuji suggested. That got the whole team cheering, including Kasumi.

"You have to promise me one thing though." Akechi said, which got everyone's attention. "You have to promise me that this will be the Phantom Thieves' last heist. After this, the team shall be disbanded. What do you think?"

Akira glanced around at everyone. Then he pushed up his glasses and answered, "Let's make this our last mission to remember." His response got the whole team roaring out of excitement (sans Akechi).

_And honestly, Kasumi felt the most excited about going after the next target..._


	19. Chapter 19: Gambling

Chapter 19: Gambling

Sae's Palace is quite...interesting.

For starters, it's a casino, which could fit Sae's desire to win at any cost. To be frank, there's really nothing to worry about.

...Well, besides the fact that Crow requested the calling card to be sent on November 18th, which is oddly specific and therefore, suspicious. It makes one wonder what Crow is really up to...

But other than that, there's nothing for Rogue to worry about!

And to be honest, she had never expected the latest Palace raid to be...quite fun, especially considering her situation. It helps that this Palace is more lively and most importantly...

_**It actually has games for her to play!**_

She took notice of the dice game once the team strolled past. She immediately became eager to play it. "Ooh, can we play this game? Please, please, please?" Rogue begged. Crow lightly chuckled as he replied, "Knock yourself out." There's a bit of a sinister tone to his voice there, but Rogue didn't care. At the moment, her mind is all about games, games, GAMES!

"Pick the numbers 1-7 or 8-13!" The dealer said. "8-13!" Rogue exclaimed. The dealer then rolled a pair of dices and vigorously threw them at the table. The dices rolled over to reveal...7! "Better luck next time." The dealer stated while laughing.

Rogue kicked the wall out of frustration. "Gah! This game is so rigged!" She claimed. "It IS rigged. We're in someone's palace, remember?" Yusuke reminded her. That made Rogue grin sheepishly as she replied, "Oh, right, hehe..." Then the Phantom Thieves left to take care of some business.

After solving the dice game puzzle and getting some tokens, the Phantom Thieves went to the slot game room next.

Needless to say, the sight was quite astonishing. Slot machines galore! And the lively atmosphere made it much better too! This must have been one of the most popular games in this casino...

Once they got to the biggest slot machine ever, Rogue stared at it in awe. "Whoa... I definitely want to play on this slot machine!" She said.

Before she could start up the game though, Joker stopped her. "Huh?" She blurted out as she looked at Joker. "I have a plan. Wait here until we get back. Then we can let you play." He explained.

Normally, that would prompt Rogue to ask questions, but she was too eager to care! This is definitely her favorite Palace! "Ok!" She responded eagerly. Then the Phantom Thieves left to go somewhere.

You wanna know what Rogue's favorite casino game is? Slots! You wanna know what Rogue's least favorite game is? The waiting game! And she couldn't believe how unbelievably boring that game was!

She stared up at the humongous slot machine... Hmm... They wouldn't mind if she started the game a little early, right?

She reached over to the lever and she was about to pull it...until the Phantom Thieves ran back to her. She immediately retracted her hand from the lever, hoping they didn't notice. Thankfully, they didn't.

"Alright, you can play now." Joker confirmed. Rogue's hand immediately shot back to the lever and pulled it. The slots spun and spun continuously for several seconds. Then the first slot stopped on a 7.

"Ooh! That seems like a good sign!" Oracle commented as the second slot rested upon a 7 too.

"How fascinating..." Fox mused, as everyone else watched with anticipation.

The third and final slot began to stop...

_**...on a 7 AS WELL!**_

"Ahhhhh! That's it! A 777!" Panther screamed, but that got drowned out by Rogue's MUCH louder scream. She is beyond ecstatic that she won! Lots and lots of tokens spilled out to the floor while Rogue danced out of joy!

"Watching this made all the walking and hacking worth it." Oracle whispered to Joker with a giggle, as he nodded in agreement.

The Phantom Thieves ran around the dark hallways. It took quite some work—and a day to change Sae's cognition—to get to a higher floor, but they made it and now they're playing some sort of a dark maze game.

Admittedly, it's a little daunting to go through such a maze, but the Phantom Thieves got this. Rogue is very confident of this.

And then, out of nowhere, an enemy has completely blindsided them and ambushed Joker, which meant an enemy gets to attack first!

Since Rogue had opted to be one of the back-up members this time around, she can only watch as a very strong enemy attacked a team of Joker, Noir, Queen, and Mona. The way the attack was coordinated drained their health to dangerous levels pretty quickly. That's when Rogue knew that she needed to do something about it.

"Hey, Joker?" She called out, which got his attention. "Is there any chance that I can join this battle?"

Joker nodded. "Actually, yes. I just need to switch the positions around." Then he glanced at Mona. "Mona, would it be fine if Rogue takes your place?" He asked. Mona nodded. "I don't mind at all." He replied before stepping back to allow Rogue into the front lines.

Rogue stepped in. She's totally prepared for this. She has learned many new skills throughout all of these missions...

_...and one of them is Mediarahan._

She casted this skill to all of her teammates, which healed up all of their healths, returning the energy to them.

Thanks to that, the team had no problem taking this Shadow down as they used their strongest skills against this enemy.

After that whole kerfuffle, Joker looked over at Rogue. A small hint of a smile can be seen on his face as he said, "Thanks."

Rogue smiled back as she responded with, "No problem."

_This whole plan was basically the Phantom Thieves gambling for their lives, but one thing's for sure: Rogue can definitely feel her faith for the Phantom Thieves being restored again..._


	20. Chapter 20: Operation

Chapter 20: Operation

"Whoa..."

"That battle sure was something..."

"It felt like it was gonna take forever, but we finally took her down..."

The day has come and they took the opportunity to steal her heart after sending her a calling card on a weirdly specific date of November 18th.

But hey, that doesn't matter now! Today's a big day and they already took care of Shadpw Sae! She basically buffs herself and debuffs her enemies while using simple, but deadly attacks, which the Phantom Thieves are pretty much used to at this point, so they took her down, no problem.

After a heartfelt sibling talk between Queen and Shadow Sae and obtaining the treasure (which seems to be a briefcase),something came up though.

Oracle scanned the Palace, only to find something alarming. "More enemies?! Where did they come from?!" She sputtered. "It seems as though law enforcements are here... We should make a break for it while we still have a chance." Crow suggested in a rather nonchalant manner. "True...but there's no way we will be able to escape with them hot on our tails. Someone should be a decoy and distract them...but who...?" Queen wondered.

One hand immediately raised for this job. Heads turn to see who that was...and it turned out to be Joker himself! Rogue wondered why the leader of the Phantom Thieves, of all people, would volunteer for such a mission. "I'll do it. I want you guys to be safe." He stated.

Admittedly, Rogue found his reasoning to be pretty heartwarming, but...it's pretty risky, even for him. "Are you sure you can do this...?" She said with concern. Joker nodded confidently as he took the briefcase. Then he ran off to do his part of the plan.

"Seems like this is our cue to go." Crow said and everyone else agreed...except for Rogue. She has other plans as she silently trailed Joker while others snuck off to the exit...

Trailing Joker wasn't easy, since he has all these smooth moves and maneuvers and whatnot, but Rogue managed despite this.

When Joker got to an empty room, Rogue thought that he seems to be doing well on his own. Not to mention that this IS Joker, after all. He always does well on his own.

So she was about to escape the place and follow the rest of the team...until she heard semi-heavy footsteps. Welp, she spoke too soon, didn't she? Oh well, time for action!

She immediately jumped out of her hiding spot and joined Joker's side as they were about to battle the guards. Here we go!

After they made short work of these guards, Rogue looked over at Joker, who pulled his gloves with a smirk. Everything's a game to him, no surprise there. He does know when to get serious though...

...No time to think about that right now. "Hey, Joker? I need to tell you something..." She said. Joker nodded, waiting for her to continue.

"Ok, so... I was the one who tricked you into going to the back room with Akechi..." Rogue began. Joker immediately replied with, "No worries, at least you gave us a head-up on what Akechi is going to do in some way."

Rogue shook her head as she sighed. "It's not just that... I also agreed to a deal with him so you guys can get arrested... I'm half the reason why we are even in this Palace in the first place!" She said with a huge hint of agony in her voice.

Joker felt a little surprised after hearing that. He didn't even know what to say.

"It's a very deplorable deed, huh?" Rogue said with some tears in her eyes. Then she walked off, parting with, "I'm quitting the Phantom Thieves... I know when I have messed up." And with that, she ran off, with Joker futilely calling her name in an effort to get her attention. But he can't go after her. Why?

_Whether he wanted Rogue back or not, he can't go after her right now, because he has to stick to his operation before it fails..._


	21. Chapter 21: Regret

Chapter 21: Regret

Kasumi walked down the lonely part of Central Street. The mission to change Sae's heart was a complete bust. And she's probably the main cause of why it was a bust.

_Or at least she thinks that. She doesn't even know anymore..._

Maybe a calm walk will calm her down? Yeah, let's try that. Maybe this will get her mind off things.

So she walked through almost every Shibuya street, taking in very sight she sees. There's a colorful mascot (read: person in a costume) standing near one of the streets... That's pretty nice, actually. After that, she visited many stores. Incidentally, she brought lots of foods. Maybe she's just buying comfort food...

After all of that, she walked back to Central Street. Honestly, the whole walk and many store visits actually helped took her mind off of it. What luck!

She smiled a little as she walked past some sort of Jumbotron that is hanging on to the side of the building, which functioned as a huge TV for everyone to watch.

And that's when she heard something urgent...

"Breaking news! The leader of the Phantom Thieves has just committed suicide while in interrogation! I repeat, the leader of the Phantom Thieves has just committed suicide while in interrogation!" The newswoman that is shown on the Jumbotron TV spouted out.

_That was enough to completely break Kasumi down._

Loads of tears spilled down her cheeks as she started to sob. After a few seconds, she ran off yet again.

_"I'm such a monster! I always seem to run away from problems and whenever I'm confronted with one, I end up backstabbing someone just to solve the problem! I dong deserve to join back with the Phantom Thieves after this..."_

"Hey, wait up!"

Kasumi turned around to see who said that and to her surprise, it was Ann. She happened to be near Kasumi when this happened, while she was doing her modeling job. She quickly wrapped up her modeling job for the day before going after Kasumi.

After seeing Kasumi's tears on her face, Ann immediately asked, "What's wrong?"

Unfortunately, Kasumi can't even utter a word due to how broken she felt inside. She kept on crying.

Ann gave off a sympathetic look and said, "Hey, it's going to be okay... Wanna come with me to Leblanc so we can talk this out?" Kasumi can only nod to that. "Alright. I'll lead the way." Ann offered and with that, she led Kasumi to the good ol' humble café.

[I] However, unbeknownst to Kasumi, Ann texted to her friends to let them all know to come meet at Leblanc...

_However, unbeknownst to Kasumi, Ann texted to her friends to let them all know to come meet at Leblanc..._

Once they got there, they saw that almost everyone in the Phantom Thieves are currently in Leblanc, to Kasumi's surprise. She felt immediate shame after thinking about the situation again. She wanted to run off once more, but Ann has other plans.

"Please sit down. We'll talk about this situation, together. Don't worry, we'll be here to support you, no matter what." Ann stated.

Welp, looks like she had no choice. She sat down on the booth seat and she sighed sadly.

"Now... What happened?" Makoto questioned.

And thus, Kasumi told a long story that explains what happened around the days leading up to the heist at Sae's Palace. Her deal with Akechi, what really happened at the school festival, how she felt throughout the whole thing... Everything.

After she was finished explaining, the others felt shocked...and then they adopted angry looks.

Kasumi knew it. Her friends are going to hate her now. She braced herself for the most scathing lecture ever...

"So Akechi truly was the reason why all of this happened. I can't believe he mastered the art of despicableness."

"He emotionally manipulated you! That's so deplorable of him! You don't deserve what he did to you!"

"Now that I think about it, he might be the reason why all of these mental shutdowns happened..."

"Grr, damn that guy! When will he learn to stop being such a horrible asshole?!"

That's what Kasumi heard instead, which greatly confused her. "Umm... Wasn't that my fault too? I genuinely believed that guys murderer Okumura and others before all of this happened..." She weakly said.

"Hey, you might have hated us for a little while, but it's alright! Everyone makes mistakes, after all!" Ryuji replied. "And besides, you ain't the one who killed people through mental shutdowns! That's more messed-up!"

Everyone else nodded in agreement. Kasumi looked at them in shock...and then she hugged all of them. "I-I really don't deserve you, guys..." She said as she cried tears of joy.

Everyone else hugged back. "Actually, we all deserve each other! That's what friends are for, after all!" Ann explained. After crying a few more years of joy, Kasumi replied with a first genuine smile in weeks. "Thank you..."

"No problem!" Everyone else chorused as they continued to let her know how much they appreciate her by continuing to hug her.

_That was the day when Kasumi's regrets finally vanished into oblivion..._


	22. Chapter 22: Patience

Chapter 22: Patience

The next day, Kasumi went over to Leblanc, first thing in the morning. She wanted to take a break after yesterday's emotional roller coaster. And a cup of coffee would be exactly what the doctor ordered. Everything's going to be alright. She's just hoping that Akira didn't actually die and that it was all part of an act. The chances may seem low, but Kasumi WILL do her best to keep her head up and stay strong this time.

Once she walked into Leblanc, she ordered a creamy coffee and Sojiro got to work on making the coffee. While this is going on though, someone just entered and that someone happens to be...Futaba!

Of course, she would be here around opening time of Leblanc, considering her adoptive father owns that café.

She sat down next to Kasumi and she smiled upon greeting with, "Yo! What's up, Kasumi?"

"Well, I'm doing much better, I suppose." Kasumi simply answered. "Awesome! Hey, wanna play some games with me?" Futaba offered.

Kasumi looked over at Futaba with curiosity. That sounds like quite an interesting offer... Sure, why not?

"Yeah!" She replied rather eagerly. "Let's go play!"

"Hey, don't forget about us!" That voice belonged to Ann, as she stood with Makoto and Haru at the entrance. Seems like every girl in the Phantom Thieves team are going to hang out together. Interesting.

Kasumi smiles as she replied, "You guys can join too!" And thus, every girl in Leblanc cheered, surprising Sojiro. "Whoa... There's never been this much excitement in this café before..." He commented as the girls ran upstairs to play.

Train of Life has got to be one of Futaba's favorite games, not just because it's a party game, but also because of its wide variety of randomness.

"In this round, the dice rolls will be favorable to the player that has the most screen time." The game stated. Haru sighed as she commented, "I can undoubtedly predict how this will go..."

Ann went first, lucky to be one of the founding members of the Phantom Thieves. She rolled and it gave her a six.

"You will get the Bagel of Enlightenment from a friendly hippo! Congratulations, you moved three spaces!"

Ann cheered after the game said that. "Talk about lucky!" She said with a smile.

"My turn!" Makoto said as she rolled a 5.

"You just got chased by a nerdy crocodile who will only tell you boring facts... Luckily, you got chased ahead through three spaces. Unfortunately, you fell asleep once you get to the third space, making you lose a turn."

"What?! How does that make any sense?!" Makoto said in a flabbergasted tone while everyone else laughed. "That's just the Train of Life for you!" Futaba responded as she chuckled.

Kasumi's turn was next and she rolled, only to get a 1.

"You just gained an idea to sing the song about stabbing the sword of justice. You're stuck on one space because you love that song too much."

"Oh well, at least the song is catchy." Kasumi said with a shrug. The aforementioned song played for the rest of the round.

Futaba rolled next and she end up receiving a 7.

"Uh-oh, looks like a vengeful octopus is screaming at you for no reason! If you roll higher than a 5, you can scare it off with a louder scream!"

"Here goes!" Futaba said as she rolled again. She got an eight!

After that, she screamed at the TV, which scared the other girls. "What the heck was that?" Kasumi asked, feeling so bewildered right now. "Just making sure that the scream works! Mwehehehe!" Futaba replied with a mischievous chuckle.

"You successfully scared the octopus away! Move ahead 4 spaces!"

"See?" Futaba said as she crossed her arms, feeling pretty victorious right now.

Finally, it's Haru's turn. "This won't be good." She predicted. She rolled a two.

"You just give up and walk off the game board. Game over for you!"

She resisted the urge to throw the controller at the TV. "This specific round is very rigged! The screen time round is pretty much a foregone conclusion!" She said before laughing from the sheer ridiculousness of this game, with the other girls joining in on the laughter.

Many hours has passed and now, it's the sunset evening for the city of Tokyo. The girls stopped playing at this point and they went downstairs, planning to have some conversations.

Morgana, Ryuji, and Yusuke were already waiting down there.

Once they all reunited, Ann asked them, "Any sign of Akira arriving yet?"They all shook their heads. "Unfortunately not..." Yusuke replied sadly.

"I wonder if he's really ok..." Kasumi said. "No worries, he'll arrive right before you know it!" Ann replied cheerfully.

As of on cue, Akira walked inside the Leblanc entrance. Talk about uncanny timing, huh?

As soon as his friends noticed, they SWARMED around Akira, eagerly and happily welcoming him back, including Kasumi. "Welcome back, Akira!" She greeted. Akira responded with a smile as he said, "Nice to see you guys again too!

_Thanks to a little patience and faith, Akira managed to return after a big operation..._


	23. Chapter 23: Hope

Chapter 23: Hope

Long story short, Rogue was invited back into the team and she couldn't be any more happier. Now that she finally got that complicated stuff out of the way (and now that Joker was able to figure out about the next target), she and the Phantom Thieves were ready to tackle Shido's Palace!

And wow, they definitely were ready for this! With the exception of those needlessly complicated mouse mazes, they were blasting through the cruise ship! They managed to get all five letters of introduction like it's no problem! Seems like they were beyond prepared this time!

Before they managed to get out of the engine room though, a familiar face landed in front of them. Rogue gasped upon seeing said familiar face.

_Oh no, it's Goro Akechi, AKA Crow._

Crow looked at Joker with mild surprise. "Huh... You actually managed to fake your death and trick me, of all people... Impressive." He mused.

"Crow...? What are you doing here?" Panther questioned. "Well, I'm just here to initiate my true master plan of justice... Since I'm Shido's bastard child and...since he left, causing my late mother to commit suicide, he will pay... I will give him the taste of revenge and backstab him! All for the name of justice!"

After his rant, Crow laughed madly. Oh no, it seems like he's now on the downward spiral of insanity...

"What? Crow, it doesn't have to be like this... We are the Phantom Thieves, not the Phantom Murderers." Fox responded with a glare. "Yeah, the things we do are real justice, not your shitty actions!" Skull retorted.

Crow growled angrily and then he said, "Whatever! Let's fight!"

And with that, the battle began. Crow began the battle by summoning two Shadows...and making them go berserk! That certainly surprised the Phantom Thieves. Sure, these berserk Shadows are more stronger than usual...but at the end of the day, they're still just Shadows, so the Phantom Thieves made short work of these goons.

That's when Crow ran into the front lines, ready to fight them all by himself. Now, that part of the fight wasn't all that impressive... Crow simply attacks the team and that's it. Although, he is noticeably targeting Joker more than the others... There's some serious history between them, that's for sure.

Regardless, they easily defeated Crow. The team felt pretty confident about winning this battle...

_...but Crow is not down yet._

He gets back up...and the team thought that now is the good time to get Crow back on their side, despite his recent actions.

"You know, we can work together to make sure that true justice is served." Queen suggested. "Yeah... What she said." Skull said.

Crow had enough of this. He end up screaming, "Shut up, shut UP, SHUT UP! ENOUGH OF YOUR SELF-RIGHTEOUS BULLSHIT!" Yup, he has definitely lost it.

All of a sudden, an ominous red aura has appeared around him. Crow is shaking out of anger as he ranted, "YOU GUYS DO NOTHING BUT PISS ME OFF!" He then laughed maniacally as his clothes changed from a white Phantom Thief attire...to a dark suit, fitted with a black mask. And he also brung out his true Persona, Loki!

The Phantom Thieves gasped. "Black mask! This can't be..." Noir lamented. "I knew it... You were behind the mental shutdowns this whole time..." Oracle sadly stated. "CONGRATULATIONS, YOU FIGURED IT OUT!" Black Mask replied sarcastically before saying, "DIE!"

Welp. They should have seen his second phase coming. No matter, Rogue is confident that they'll still defeat him. He does have all sorts of new moves that can mess them up though...

For starters, he can cast physical and magical barriers on himself, which can definitely mess them up. Fox found that out the hard way when he tried attacking Black Mask when his physical barrier was currently up. Needless to say, he got damaged instead.

Despite all of these new attacks, the Phantom Thieves managed to whittle down Black Mask's health, bit by bit. They can't go on any longer though...

"We need to come up with a plan, and fast." Queen stated as she switched to the front lines after Fox fell down from exhaustion. Joker rubbed his chin in thought...and he snapped his fingers with a smile. "I have an idea." He simply stated and then he whispered the plan to his teammates.

After that, they got in position. Black Mask currently has a physical barrier around him... It's time to put this plan into action!

Queen casted Mediarahan on the party, giving the team enough energy to execute the plan.

Skull ran at Black Mask and attacked him. Sure, he got damaged from the physical barrier, but he also managed to take said barrier down! So far, so good...

Rogue casted Kougaon on Black Mask, weakening him significantly. This might be it...!

Joker ran at Black Mask and attacked him with his full strength. That managed to finish Blask Mask off!

The plan turned out to be a total success! Now Black Mask doesn't have enough energy left to fight anymore!

Black Mask weakly looked at the team, feeling shocked about how this all turned out.

And to his surprise, the team is still trying to bring him back to their side. Didn't they realize what he just did?! They must be really persistent then...

"Dude, you can still join our cause and help deliver true justice to Shido! What do ya say?" Skull offered.

"H-How are you guys this forgiving...? It would be easier for you if you could kill me right here." Black Mask incredulously stated. "True, but we don't kill, we steal and change hearts!" Rogue replied. "Hmph... Well, it looks like I have no choice, don't I...?" Black Mask said with a shrug as he got up.

Before anything else could happen though, someone else entered the scene. And to everyone's confusion, it's...another Akechi?

Mona gasped out of shock. "This must have been Shido's cognition of Akechi!" He theorized.

The Akechi cognition smirked as he said, "That's right, and I'll do anything for Shido... Even kill others and die in the process..." Sheesh, this Akechi cognition is borderline insane, and that's saying something, considering that the real deal is in the same room. "Now, why don't you let me clean up the loose ends and kill all of you guys in this room?"

Right after he said that, more Shadows appeared around him. "Oh geez, what are we gonna do now?!" Oracle panicked. Before they can even comprehend what is going on at this point though... Black Mask took out his gun...and shot it at the control panel, which made some sort of a huge door appear between the Phantom Thieves and Black Mask, along with the enemies.

"Just go... I'll take care of this!" Black Mask said. "But what about you, Akechi-kun?" Noir asked worriedly. "No need to worry... Just promise me one thing... Change Shido's heart...and make the public see his true horrible self!" Black Mask insisted.

That's when the Phantom Thieves heard an intense gunfight between Black Mask and Cognitive Akechi. Then that side of the room became completely silent. No sounds at all.

"Oh... So it has come to this, huh...?" Fox lamented. "Yeah... It's quite tragic, really...but we must fulfill this promise." Queen stated. "Yeah! We must help the weak and reform society!" Rogue rallied her teammates. That succeeded as everyone else nodded and they went on their way to continue their mission.

_This whole event was quite a rollercoaster, but Rogue exited this situation with lots of hope in her heart..._


	24. Chapter 24: Discovery

Chapter 24: Discovery

So... They finally did it.

They sent a calling card in the most epic way possible by hijacking the satellite waves and sending a huge broadcast about the Phantom Thieves planning to steal Shido's heart, while also revealing that the leader is still alive.

They stormed Shido's Palace on the day of the heist. It was quite arduous, as they had to battle Shadow Shido's MANY forms, which are often durable. Not only that, but he often hits hard too, especially in his buff form.

Despite all of that, the Phantom Thieves managed to defeat Shadow Shido, steal the treasure, and escape his Palace.

They essentially completed all the steps to change Shido's heart. And on the day of the deadline, they will get to reap the reward! It's made even better when the day itself arrived, where Shido broadcasted an entire confession about his rotten and underhanded methods to become the next prime minister. Mission accomplished, right? Now people can see how he's actually a bad guy and they wouldn't vote for him, therefore, society can finally be back to normal!

_Except that it didn't happen._

The group hung out at the train station Accessway, observing the people around them. This is what they're hearing from people:

"Boy, I can't wait to see Shido become prime minister already!"

"Yeah, same! He will be the proper leader for this god forsaken country."

"Why would we vote for anyone else besides Shido? He's a much more reliable person for this job than all the other candidates combined!"

It turns out that people didn't actually believe that Shido had committed those horrible deeds, despite the proof being broadcasted right in front of their faces before.

Kasumi frowned at this turn of events. "This is getting pretty eerie..." She commented. "Yeah, it's like these people were getting controlled or something like that!" Ryuji observed. "Whatever this is, it's anything but good, that's for sure." Makoto stated.

Everyone sighed sadly...until Morgana purred loudly. "I think I may have a theory...and an idea! Guys, let's meet up at Leblanc tomorrow to discuss our next move!" He said.

That definitely piqued their curiosity. "Alright, sounds like a plan." Akira agreed and thus, their current meet-up was adjourned.

One day later and the whole team practically filled up the downstairs portion of Leblanc as the evening falls. Sojiro and Sae (who truly know who the Phantom Thieves are and what their noble purpose is) are also here to become a part of this meeting.

"It's unfortunate that the police forces are now aggressively participating in the investigation of the Phantom Thieves... Who knows, they might even arrest all of you if you give them a few days in this investigation. We must get this over with quick..." Sae stated. "Agreed... Now, what's your plan, Morgana?" Makoto asked.

The Metaverse feline lets out a chuckle before replying with, "So you do know that the whole public has a corrupted heart at this point, right?"

"Well, yeah. I mean, we all have desires at some point or another." Ryuji said with a shrug."True, but their demeanor doesn't even seem natural... It seems more forced..." Haru responded sadly. "And furthermore, how are we supposed to steal everyone's hearts?" Yusuke questioned.

Morgana smirked as he answered, "Mementos."

Silence filled the room for the next several seconds. It's clear that they are confused...but they caught on to what Morgana said after several seconds have passed.

"Ohh, I get it! Mementos is basically the whole public's Palace! We can change their hearts from there!" Futaba deduced.

Morgana nodded. "Correct! And all we have to do is get to the deepest part of Mementos and steal the public's treasure there!"

Everyone was about to cheer, but Morgana wasn't done yet. "There's just one thing though..."

They looked at Morgana with a quizzical look.

"Once we steal the public's treasure and change their hearts... The Metaverse will be destroyed...That means once we finish this job, we won't be able to become the Phantom Thieves anymore. In other words, this will be our last job..." Morgana lamented.

That sure put a damper on the team's mood.

Kasumi frowned as she said, "I see..." Then she puts on a determined look. "If that means reforming society and helping others in a long run... Then so be it."

"Yeah! We will succeed in this, no matter what!" Ryuji rallied. That lifted everyone's spirits as they cheered.

Morgana's eyes lit up happily. "For real...?" He said. Everyone else nodded to confirm this. "Then it's settled! We'll get started on this mission first thing tomorrow!" He stated. The whole team cheered again.

Sojiro glanced at Sae with a confused look on his face. "I have no idea what's going on at this point..." He said. Sae smirked as she replied, "You'll get used to it with these guys. At least they seem confident enough for their next mission." Sojiro nodded in agreement.

Today's finally the day. December 24th. What timing, considering that if they succeed at this mission, it'll be like the greatest Christmas present ever to them.

The Phantom Thieves are standing at the Mementos entrance, preparing themselves for their final heist.

Rogue looked around at the whole group. They obviously seem quite hyped for this mission. And to be honest, Rogue is feeling the same way.

Mona turned to look at the team. "Is everyone ready?" He asked. Everyone nodded and Mona smiled. "Good. Now let's go!"

_And with that, everyone headed off towards the deepest part of Mementos, where they will no doubt make huge discoveries there..._


	25. Chapter 25: Resolve

Chapter 25: Resolve

Welp... The series of discoveries that the Phantom Thieves are making recently are anything but pleasant.

Once they got to the depths of Mementos, all they saw were people in some sort of prison. They figured out that these people were practically trapped in such an oppressive society. Their comments definitely supported that theory.

"I wanted to help others too...but what's the point in a society like this?"

"You should just give up and think like the rest of us. Otherwise, you're basically just killing yourselves over nothing."

"Trust me, there's nothing safer than this prison. It's a whole lot better than reforming society, which is a whole lot more dangerous."

Needless to say, the Phantom Thieves felt unnerved to the max, but they're not going to let that stop them from completing their last mission. "These people felt that there's no hope at all... So let's give them the reason to have hope again." Panther said and everyone else nodded in agreement. They need to do this. "Yeah! Let's show our strong resolve and finish this!" Skull shouted.

And thus, they continued on. It was pretty much smooth sailing from there (well, besides the guard's occasional sneak attacks)...until they got to what looks like a huge ancient artifact.

"Hey, you think this could be the public's treasure?" Queen asked. "Possibly..." Mona said with his usual vagueness. "Let's go check it out!" Oracle suggested.

They went over to the same area as the ancient artifact and they inspected it closer until...

"I have been expecting you, rebels..."

They looked around to see where the voice was coming and they were surprised to see that the voice came from the ancient artifact itself.

"I am the Holy Grail, giving much-needed order to humanity. In a way, I am their precious god! Without me, the humans will be very lost! That's why they feel very comfortable when I tell them what to do!" The Holy Grail boasted.

"Hell no! You're no one's god! We're free to live our own lives, you asshole! You have no damn right to tell us what to do!" Skull cursed in pretty much every sentence he said here. Yup, he is that outraged. The rest of the Phantom Thieves agreed, whatever the Holy Grail did was pretty messed up.

"Is that so? Well, allow me to teach you a lesson on how you should worship me..." The Holy Grail said. "Never! We'll teach you a lesson first!" Panther retorted.

After that, the battle has begun. The Phantom Thieves opted to simply attack the Holy Grail and see how it reacts.

After some attacks and taking a fair bit of health from it, the Holy Grail...fully healed itself! No way! It also gained some color after doing this.

"What...? This can't be..." Fox said. Despite this, they continued to attack.

What does the Holy Grail do after their second set of attacks? Believe it or not, it fully healed itself again! It's almost restoring its full color too.

"Dammit! How does it keep doing that?!" Skull growled out of frustration. They tried attacking once more.

At this point, it should be no surprise that the Holy Grail healed itself yet again. What IS surprising, however, is that the Holy Grail's color is now fully restored, looking good as new!

The Phantom Thieves didn't have time to focus on that at the moment, feeling outraged over this turn of events. "No faie! This thing is totally cheating!" Oracle complained.

"Now all of you will pay for your insolence..." The Holy Grail threatened the Phantom Thieves.

They all guarded for the Holy Grail's first attack (finally)...except this wasn't a regular attack at all. It shot huge lasers at all of them, which easily took all of them down.

"Now you will learn your lesson to respect me...and worship me..." The Holy Grail trailed off ominously as the whole team lost consciousness...

After what felt like a while, the group finally woke up. They immediately looked around their surroundings.

Wait, they're back in the real world? That's weird...

They looked around the Shibuya district, wondering what just happened. "Did we...do it?" Haru asked. Ann frowned as she replied, "I don't think we did... We just got beaten by the Holy Grail..." Haru frowned as well as she said, "Oh... What's going to happen now?"

As if on cue, the sky suddenly turned red...and it started raining blood! Not only that, but some skeletal structures popped up from the ground, forming some sort of buildings. And what's stranger is that absolutely no one besides the Phantom Thieves (and some people who supported and aided the Phantom Thieves) have noticed this sudden change AT ALL!

To be frank, this place is slowly turning into hell.

Just then, the Holy Grail's voice sounded throughout their heads. "The Metaverse and reality have now become one... Now everyone will live in peace, doing whatever I say. You all should learn to live with all of this." It said.

"How about no?!" Ryuji retorted. "There's no way we can live like this!" Futaba complained. "It's absolutely dreadful!" Makoto stated angrily. "I want the society to be reformed, not to turn into literal hell!" Kasumi huffed.

"You all will never learn, will you? Well then..." The Holy Grail trailed off ominously yet again.

And when they were about to question what's going to happen next... Futaba suddenly fell down! She was holding her head as if she's having a headache right now...which, considering the situation, she probably is.

"Futaba!" Ann shouted out of worry as she knelt beside her. That's when she suddenly fell backwards too. At that point, that's when she and the rest of the team see the real problem: They were disappearing from existence!

Soon, everyone else followed. Futaba cried before she disappeared...

Ann shivered out of fear before she too disappeared...

Ryuji was next, as he cursed the Holy Grail for causing this...

There goes Haru, as she silently contemplated her existence...as she disappeared from existence...

And then Yusuke disappeared as well, as he said, "I don't feel so good..." How unfortunate...

Makoto lamented on how they failed their mission before she's also gone...

That just left only Morgana, Kasumi, and Akira. Morgana looked at both of them before saying, "I'm so sorry that I failed you all..." Akira stepped towatds him and said, "It's not your fault." Morgana can only look pitifully at him before disappearing from existence and adding to the non-existent body count.

Kasumi seemed to take this situation the hardest, as she sobbed and shivered in fright. "I-I don't want to go... I really don't...!" She managed to say before devolving into sobs again. Akira then walked over to her and hugged her. That actually managed to comfort her a little as she hugged back. "It's going to be alright. I'm sure of it." He stated.

Kasumi smiled a little...until he too disappeared without a trace... That's when Kasumi suddenly fell down, about to go away as well. She rolled over and the bloody sky was pretty much her final sight before she became the final victim and disappeared...

_Not only did her entire being disappear...but her resolve disappeared too at this very moment..._


	26. Chapter 26: Inner Conflict

Chapter 26: Inner Conflict

Kasumi slowly opened her eyes. Wait a minute... She's not dead, after all! Hooray! Where is she though...?

She slowly got up and looked around. There's some sort of blue glow to this place. Upon closer inspection though, she realized in horror that she's actually in prison.

Panic slowly started to overtake her...until she realized that she might be in the Metaverse right now. Sweet, but... It turns out she's currently not wearing her phantom thief clothes at the moment... She's currently wearing casual clothes. That's weird...

...Oh no.

What if she lost her powers?! She did feel her resolve disappearing back when she disappeared from existence...

...Oh, what's the point? Society can never be reformed at this point, so... If you can't beat them, join them? That didn't feel particularly right, but she has no other choice. So she slumped down into the floor, about to mope for the rest of her life...until she heard voices.

"It seems you have discovered my true colors, Trickster... Let's make a deal..."

She had no idea who's saying this, but this person sounds just like the Holy Grail... Maybe she's hearing things?

And she also had no idea who this Trickster is? Like, she hadn't even heard of this term until now.

"If you accept my deal, I will return the world to its former glory and the Phantom Thieves will finally get respect they so desperately crave... In turn, I will just rule this world... What do you say?

"I will never accept this horrible deal."

Oh my gosh, that sounded like Akira! Phew, at least she's not alone.

She heard the Holy Grail guy growl as he responded with, "You'll be sorry..."

Then all of a sudden, an elderly man with a long rose appeared in front of Kasumi's cell. "Hello, my name is Igor. I'm here to make a deal with you." He said with a deep and somewhat intimidating voice.

His appearance startled Kasumi and she was on guard the whole time. "What is your intention?" She questioned.

Igor chuckled as he said, "Why, I just want peace for everyone! All this strife is not worth it, after all... Wouldn't you agree?" That earned a curious look from Kasumi. Then she slowly nodded.

"Good. Now, here's the deal. If you accept it, true justice will finally come to this world. No one will have to wear any social masks because there will be no more bad people in this world. Everyone can be a good person now and justice will be restored. Everyone who has suffered a loss will get their losses back. And not only that, but I will restore this world to its former glory. What do you say?" Igor explained.

Kasumi rubbed her chin in thought. On one hand, her life will finally be going back to normal without any chaos and strife anyone. On the other hand, Igor seems kinda suspicious...

...Eh, what the heck! Sounds like a pretty sweet deal, doesn't it?

"It's a deal!" Kasumi accepted the deal as Akita's anguished scream can be heard. That unnerved Kasumi a little, but what's done is done, she supposed.

"Good choice." Igor replied before flicking his fingers. A bright flash of white light grew and it enveloped the entire room. Kasumi has no idea what's going on, but she assumed that something good is about to happen.

_And besides, she can feel her inner conflict disappearing from her already._


	27. Chapter 27: Anger

Chapter 27: Anger

Kasumi slowly opened her eyes again. Where is she this time?

She took a look around. It seems that she's now back in the Shibuya district. Sweet! Wait, what day is it? She checked her phone calendar. Oh, today is December 25th! AKA Christmas!

She checked her phone for any messages. She saw that pretty much every one of her friends gave off an excited reply, sharing exciting news in their group chat. She read them all:

_Ryuji: I'm now part of the track team again! Now I can relieve an awesome pastime of mine and I'm so damn happy about that!_

_Morgana: I'm finally a human! This is the best day of my life!_

_Ann: I finally got to see Shiho again! It turns out she didn't transfer after all, hehe!_

_Yusuke: I have managed to show Sayuri at an art museum and now I'm getting famous because of it!_

_Makoto: My Sister just found a perfect university for me! What a time to be alive!_

_Futaba: My mom came back to life! I don't know how, but I don't care! I'm so happy to see my mom again!_

_Haru: My father came back as well and I'm also happy to see him! He is also back to his normal nice self! This is the happiest day of my life!_

Kasumi smiled at all of these messages. It turns out that she made a great decision after all! Thank goodness!

Before she went to Leblanc to unwind though, she heard heavy breathing from behind. It sounded like someone's exhausted.

She turned around to see that this person was...Akira!

"Akira...? Are you okay...?" She questioned. He shook his head no. "What's wrong...?" She asked.

He sighed as he cuts straight to the chase. "Why did you accept his deal?" He asked with a hint of an incredulous tone. "I thought we can restore all peace this way?" She replied with a confused look.

Akira shook his head again. "Not exactly. Now no one can think for themselves anymore. Not even our friends!" He respinded, his frown starting to grow.

Kasumi shook her head as she said, "But our friends are happy though. And isn't that what really matters in the end?"

Akira sighed, retorting with, "But if something bad happens, our friends will think that it was nothing and do nothing about it! Their resolves are still shattered! Don't you get it?" He's growing a little more frustrated with this... He might even be getting a little angry.

But nothing can match Kasumi's anger though. Oh no, she's just about HAD it with the ungratefulness that Akira is apparently displaying here.

"You don't like how things are going right now? Then why don't you GET THE HELL OUT OF TOKYO?! It seems that you will never be satisfied, huh?!" She screamed.

That end up startling Akira. He did not like where this situation is going at all. He just stood in silence and shock.

Kasumi shook her head as she walked off. "You know what, I'm done with the Phantom Thieves, and this time, I don't want to come back, EVER!" She abrasively said. Then she continued walking off, with Akira only staring at her in shock. Turns out that this was the worst Christmas ever...

_And from that point on, Kasumi's anger grew to the point that she might even develop her own Palace in her heart..._


	28. Chapter 28: Loose Ends

Chapter 28: Loose Ends

Needless to say, Kasumi's mood only got worse and worse as time goes on. She felt as if no one understood her anymore. Well, that's their loss! She doesn't need them anyways.

It was like that for a couple of months...until March 8.

That's when she woke up, expecting yet another ordinary day...only to wake up in an unfamiliar location. From the looks of it, she seems to be in a bright and fancy room with a chrome look to it.

She tried to move around, but she quickly discovered that she couldn't due to getting tied to the wall with...shadow tentacles? What is even going on here?!

She started to struggle, but she heard an evil laugh that occurred shortly after. Someone else walked into the room..:and they looked just like her!

The only difference is that this particular version of her wears a red school uniform instead of a regular black and she seems to be wearing a necklace made out of thorns. Not to mention that she's also sporting some devil horns. And of course, she has yellow eyes. Kasumi gasped as she came into a realization.

_This person is Shadow Kasumi._

She had a sick feeling in her stomach as she realized what this means: She developed her own Palace!

"Starting to figure this out yet?" Shadow Kasumi said with a devilish smirk. Kasumi slowly nodded. "Well, congratulations, you now have your own sky mansion slash Palace! How does it feel?" Kasumi slowly nodded again. She doesn't have enough strength to respond to her quips. "Oh, it feels great, doesn't it?" Shadow Kasumi continued.

Kasumi does have a couple of questions though. "H-How did I get here?" She asked. "Oh, well, you finally finished developing in your heart last night and so, it immediately became reality in the real world due to the real world still being fused with the Metaverse. All we needed was the original owner of this Palace in order to keep it afloat." Shadow Kasumi explained.

Kasumi gasped after hearing this. "So does that mean I'm the Treasure of this Palace?" She theorized. "Precisely!" Shadow Kasumi replied.

Kasumi then frowned. "But what about my friends?" She weakly questioned.

"Oh, they can just make a simple pathway that will lead to this Palace by just believing that there's still some good in you and that there's still a chance for you to have a change of heart...except they won't."

The poor red-haired girl started to feel his spirits break. "W-What...?" She said.

Her shadow continued to explain. "You see, you were being an absolute jerk to one of your most trusted friends and then you ever talked to all of your friends for months. And for what? Just because they don't agree with your ideals?"

Kasumi can only look down in sadness as her shadow kept on talking. "Eh, screw them! Your ideals are more important than helping others, right? Too bad you don't get friends by doing so. Oh well, again, screw them! After all, nothing's better than having people do everything the way you expect them! Letting them be apathetic is the worst thing in the world to you, so now you just expect people to care about everything on their own instead of actually helping others do so by setting a good example! Welp, I guess not actually doing anything about it is more of your style."

Kasumi's mind was just about to break from all of her shadow's jeers...until she heard some rapidly approaching set of footsteps. She looked up to see the Phantom Thieves running inside this room! Seems like they still have hope in their hearts! ...Either that or it's just strong willpower. She does not feel fully confident about them forgiving her yet.

"Oh, we're really doing this, huh? Sorry, but you'll never take this treasure!" Shadow Kasumi boasted as she then multiplied into four Shadow Kasumis!

"We'll see about that!" Skull retorted. "I have a good feeling that this will be a piece of cake. After all, you are using the same trick that Shadow Madarame used." Fox explained.

"Oh yeah? Has he tried this?" One Shadow Kasumi said as she attacked the Phantom Thieves with Makougaon. All of them dodged...except Joker, who is weak to bless attacks. He tripped up and felt dizzy as he sat on the floor, unable to do anything at the moment. "JOKER!" All of his allies screamed out of distress.

Unfortunately, the Shadow Kasumis weren't done yet. The next three casted the exact same spell on all of them, eventually hitting them and hurting them significantly, with Joker being the most damaged. He felt like he's going to faint any second now.

Kasumi watched all of this with a look of horror on her face. She couldn't take any more of this carnage. It's actually tearing her up inside... She wished she could actually do something to help...and that's when it hit her...

_That's also the exact same moment where she re-discovered her true resolve of helping others._

She's even starting to feel her confidence come back as her casual outfit switched into her Phantom Thief outfit, while also freeing herself from her little prison. Rogue is back!

Once she got back to the action, she immediately retaliates with Makougaon, dishing out revenge for her malicious copies. And surprisingly, they easily went down as lots of black ooze exploded out of them.

Rogue looked on in surprise for a few seconds. "Oh, I'm starting to see how this fight might resemble a battle against a certain skeleton. They are formidable and yet, they get defeated easily once you get a chance to attack." Fox observed as he and the others got up.

Rogue noticed them getting up and she immediately went over to hug them. "Guys! You're okay! Oh my gosh, I was so worried back there!" She said before starting to cry. Naturally, this made Joker ask, "What's wrong? Was it because of what I did before you suddenly stopped talking to us? Because if so, I'm sorry-"

"No. I'm the one that should be really sorry. I let my own ideals cloud my judgements and my true need of helping others who couldn't help themselves... I'm so sorry for being such a jerk... You all probably think that I'm a selfish girl now... I understand if you do..." Rogue said before crying some more. She was about to leave the scene...that is, until every one of her friends hugged her, including Joker!

"It's alright. I understand your past dilemmas... I'm so glad that you finally found your true resolve though." Joker stated. "Yeah! We all have that time in our lives where we don't even know who we are! I'm proud of you for getting past that stage with us, Rogue!" Panther added. Everyone else nodded in agreement.

"Aww, you guys!" Rogue said, starting to finally feel genuine happiness in such a long time. Everything is now alright in her life.

Before they could leave the Palace though, all the black ooze slowly came together and it formed Shadow Kasumi again!

"What the hell?!" Skull shouted while everyone else stayed silent out of shock.

Shadow Kasumi simply sneered as she said, "You asked for it..." Before they can ask her what she was about to do, Shadow Kasumi started to mutate into something monstrous!

Within minutes, Shadow Kasumi turned from her normal form to a gigantic monster with many sharp tentacles! As soon as it appeared, it immediately destroyed the Palace into pieces with its size.

Mona turned into his vehicle form as everyone entered said vehicle, ready for their biggest battle of their lives.

_Seems like there's one more loose end to tie up here..._


	29. Chapter 29: Unexpected

Chapter 29: Unexpected

Welp, it seems like this Palace is completely destroyed now. There's only pieces of ground left in the sky...which strangely makes up a convenient road for the Morganamobile to drive on.

The Phantom Thieves looked at the gigantic monster, wondering what to do. They can obviously try to use magic attacks since those attacks are long-ranged and therefore, they could reach this monster. They just need to find good footing on the crumbled ground.

Another thing the Phantom Thieves have noticed is that this whole battle is taking place above the city of Tokyo and now people are watching out of curiosity and suspense.

"Hey... If we defeat this monster, you think thins will finally go back to normal?" Rogue asked. "Most likely. After all, this is Yaldabaoth's true form. You see, he was the imposter of Igor and it seems he masqueraded as your shadow before turning into this monster. Maybe that's why he went to you when he made that deal instead of anyone else!" Joker explained with his theory.

"Oh! Wait, what happened to the real Igor?" Rogue questioned. "He's now safe in the Velvet Room." Joker dimly answered. Well, that's a relief.

"Enough talk! Let's just focus on beating this guy and finally restore peace!" Mona stated as he turned back into his anthropomorphic cat form once everyone found a stable road to stand on.

Joker immediately used his handgun to shoot at Yaldabaoth. It damaged him, but just a little.

Skull casted Thuder Reign on him, which kinda shocked him, but he immediately shook it off. He's not gonna let status ailments affect him.

Panther was about to attack, but Yaldabaoth shot a spell out of one of his tentacles, which hits Panther. Dizziness suddenly affected her as she can't see straight.

"Lady Ann!" Mona yelled out before furiously looking at Yaldabaoth. He launched a heavy dose of Garudyne on him, which significantly damaged him.

Fox decided to add on to the attacks by using Diamond Dust on him! Way to be cold! Still doesn't stop Yaldabaoth though.

Queen managed to sneak in an Atomic Flate attack on him before he managed to attack! Too bad it doesn't stop him from attacking Noir with a sleeping spell.

That left Rogue, who simply used Kougaon on him. That enraged Yaldabaoth though and before she knew it, she end up getting stabbed by one of his spiky tentacles! She fell down as she hugged herself out of pain. "ROGUE!" Everyone else screamed, even the usually silent Joker.

Joker then glared at Yaldabaoth. "Well then. Desperate times call for desperate measures." He said as some of his teammates went over to help Rogue. Panther (who just shook away the dizziness spell) looked at him worriedly. "W-What do you mean...?" She asked. She got no response though as Joker ended up running up on the road that leads closer to Yaldabaoth!

Rogue noticed this and she weakly said, "Joker! It's t-too risky! Y-You might..." Before she could finish her sentence, Joker leapt into what looked like a core that's inside of Yaldabaoth! He ended up disappearing into it, which made all of his teammates worry. For a minute, there was nothing but silence.

"Oh no... Do you think...?" Queen trailed off. "No... I don't believe it..." Oracle said, sounding like she's about to cry. Then everyone else just looked down, starting to think that he's dead...

**"Satanael!"**

They immediately look up to see a HUGE Persona towering over Yaldabaoth. Satanael pointed a gun at Yaldabaoth's core...and shot it!

Yaldabaoth loudly growled in agony before slowly disappearing out of existence. It seems like they won the battle! Yay!

As soon as Satanael disappeared as well, Joker appeared in front of the group, who immediately hugged him upon arrival. "Joker, you're alive!" Mona cheered. Joker chuckled as he replied, "Of course I am. I wouldn't disappoint you guys, would I?" They chuckled at his near-unflappable cocky demeanor.

Only Rogue is left lying on the floor. She didn't feel as much pain as before, but she felt herself about to faint.

Her teammates immediately gathered around her. "Rogue, we did it. We won." Joker told her the good news, which made her smile a little. "We are going to offer some help to you now, ok?" Noir said. "O-Okay..." Rogue closed her eyes as soon as she said that, falling into a deep sleep.

_She may be currently unconscious, but at least she's safe with her friends...and the unexpected is finally over..._


	30. Chapter 30: Peace

Chapter 30: Peace

It felt like a year had passed before Kasumi slowly opened her eyes again. At least, it only felt like this to her. In reality, it only took a few hours for her to wake up from quite a final battle.

She slowly looked around to see that she's in Akira's attic room in Leblanc, currently lying on the bed. It's currently late afternoon.

Akira is waiting on the couch and once he noticed that she woke up, he immediately went to her side and said, "Are you ok?"

Kasumi giggled before replying, "Yes, at least I feel ok now." Then she grew curious. "Hey, what happened?" She asked.

"Well, a lot has happened during the last few hours. Most importantly, the world is now free and back to normal. Society may be still kinda messed-up, but at least it's easier to help people out now." Akira explained. Kasumi smiled as she responded, "Yeah, you're right! And I couldn't be more happier!"

"Yep!" Akira said and then he frowned a little. "Although, in turn, the Metaverse disappeared and therefore, we can't be Phantom Thieves anymore."

"Oh..." Kasumi trailed off, but she smiled again. "It's alright. At least we made society a little better before that happens." Akira nodded in agreement. Then he offered, "Hey, wanna have some coffee with me?"

"Sure!" Kasumi eagerly accepted and thus, the pair walked down to the lower level of Leblanc so they can enjoy some coffee and talk more about recent events.

Several days have passed since then... The whole gang casually hung out and spent time with each other during these relaxing days...that is, until March 20, the day that Akira leaves since his probation ends on that day.

Akira and Kasumi walked together to the Shibuya district, generally having conversations and such...until they saw an unbelievable sight.

They saw their friends in a huge silver van, looking ready to drive off, while Morgana is fixing up the car engine, despite being, well, you know, a cat. Kasumi didn't even know that her friends were capable of getting such a nice vehicle.

"Heya, guys!" Ann greeted as Kasumi and Akira approached their friends and the van. "Hello!" Kasumi and Akira both said, unaware that they both said it at the same time.

"So, it's finally your time to go, huh? Well, it's been nice spending all this time with ya! Makes it all worth it, ya know?" Ryuji commented. "Yes, but you know, we could spend time with him a little longer before he goes." Makoto said. "Yes! Which is how we came up with this little idea!" Ann stated.

That made Akira a little curious. "And what idea is that?" He questioned. "Well, here's the idea: What if we go on a little road trip before we drive you back home? That way, we can spend a little more time with you before you go...and I'm also in a mood to admire every beautiful sight I see." Yusuke said wistfully. "Ah, typical ol' Inari!" Futaba commented, earning a curious glance from Yusuke.

"So what do you think? Do you want to join us on this little road trip?" Haru offered.

Akira smiled widely. "Yeah, of course!" He said before entering the van. Then he looked back at Kasumi, along with others. "You coming?" He asked.

"Ah, no thank you. I would like to focus on studying so I can be prepared when I go back to school." Kasumi explained.

Akira shrugged as he said, "Alright. I understand. I wish you luck at school." As soon as Morgana fixed the engine, he entered the van and said, "It's time to go!"

Once everyone got in the van, they drove off, with everyone waving goodbye at Kasumi (even Makoto, who's driving and waving at the same time, showing off her surprisingly good multitasking skills). Kasumi happily waved back to her friends before they drove out of her sight.

_After everything they have been through, peace was finally restored and Kasumi couldn't be any more happier..._

(And that's the end of Kasumi's epic tale! Gee, we sure came a long way since October 2, huh? I hope you fellas enjoyed this whole journey of watching Kasumi going through a HUGE character development and becoming a person that she is today. Pretty cool, huh?

And not only that, but today's the day that Persona 5 Royal gets released (at least, for Japan, but hey, at least it still got released)! Gosh, can things get any better than this?!

_But wait, there's more!)_

It's now summer vacation. Kasumi had successfully passed the exams for the school year, which meant she's going to be a second-year for the next school year. She couldn't wait for it, but for now, she'll relax for summer vacation.

That's why Kasumi is at Leblanc, casually enjoying her coffee. She's a regular at this place now. What can she say? She LOVES the coffee that Sojiro makes.

She just finished a cup of coffee before she heard a screeching sound of a vehicle braking. She went outside to investigate what the heck that was.

What she found was a truck parked near Leblanc. That's cool, but you know what's even cooler?

She saw her friends in that truck! And better yet, Akira is there! They seem to be dressed in summer gear, looking they're ready to have a good time.

"Heya, Kasumi!" Ann greeted with everyone else waving hello. "Hello! What's going on here?" Kasumi asked.

"Well, we're all going on quite a summer vacation! Want to know why?" Makoto replied. "That's because we're going to travel around the whole country of Japan! This will be effin' awesome!" Ryuji answered excitedly. "Wondrous landmarks!" Yusuke shouted. "Delicious foods!" Futaba gushed. "New experiences!" Haru exclaimed happily.

"And I'm joining in! So what do you think? You wanna come this time, Kasumi?" Akira offered.

Kasumi's smile has just appeared on her face and it's growing more by every passing second. "Yes! I wanna come!" She accepted the offer with all the excitement she could muster.

"Then get in and join the fun!" Ann responded as she opened the door for Kasumi to get in. She immediately entered and as soon as she got in and closed the door, the truck began to move.

"Now let's go on the trip of the lifetime!" Morgana announced ad everyone cheered as the truck drove away to begin the next big adventure.

_Needless to say, everyone is hyped for the best summer vacation ever..._

(Yup, the next epic tale is coming soon and it's about Persona 5 Scramble! The next epic pre-release tale will start on February since Persona 5 Scramble will come out on February 20, 2020 (again, only in Japan, but still)! Here's hoping that you fellas will be ready for the next big tale once we get there!)

And with that said...

**PERSONA!**


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